BHUBANESWAR: With Tamil Nadu government evincing interest in the Odisha Millet Mission (OMM), the Agriculture department expressed it readiness to share its experience if the southern state desired to replicate the Odisha model.
This was discussed at an official level meeting of the two states here on Wednesday. A high level delegation from Tamil Nadu led by principal secretary, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj department P Amudha is on a visit to the state to understand different schemes being implemented through women self help groups in Odisha.
Principal secretary Agriculture Arabinda Padhee shared about the different aspects of OMM especially its farm to fork approach and focus on rural consumption of millets. He shared the excellent results in promotion of local landrace and traditional recipes through women SHGs. He said millets are also being included in ICDS and MDM programmes.
As there is no MSP for non ragi minor millets such as little millet and foxtail millet, Odisha is currently in process of arriving at benchmark price for these millets with support of OUAT, he added.As the TN officers offered support in supply of quality seeds for promotion of non-ragi millets in Odisha such as little millet and barnyard millet, Padhee readily agreed and said a technical team of the Agriculture and Farmers Empowerment department will visit Tamil Nadu for this purpose.
Agriculture director Prem Choudhury told the delegation that OMM which started in seven districts covering 30 blocks and is now expanded to 177 blocks covering 30 districts of the state.He said the Odisha government has allocated nearly `2,808 crore for next five years for the millets mission.
Chief executive officer of Odisha Livelihood Mission Mansi Nimbhal said that WSHGs played a very important role in mainstreaming of millets through processing and value addition. Focus on household consumption with grassroots level entrepreneurship around tiffin centres and threshers are helping in promotion of millets.Amudha suggested that a technical team from Tamil Nadu will also visit Odisha to understand the model in more detail.