A first-of-its-kind handbook on formation and promotion of Fish Farmer Producer Organisations (FFPOs) under the central flagship Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada Yojana (PMMSY) was released on Tuesday at an event here. The handbook, which was released by Parshottam Rupala, Union Minister of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying, provides a road map for setting up a FFPO as a cooperative and spells out simple steps to be taken by the Community Based Business Organization engaged by National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC). Sundeep Kumar Nayak, Managing Director, NCDC and Jatindra Nath Swain, Secretary, Department of Fisheries, were also present on the occasion. Rupala shared that PMMSY, the flagship scheme for fishers provides financial and technical assistance for setting up FFPOs to economically empower the fish farmers while Nayak pointed out that various awareness and sensitization programmes for promotion of FFPOs have been held in the past several months to encourage the farmers to set up such entities.
“The Department of Fisheries has kept a target of forming 500 FFPOs in the country, of which 50 FFPOs will be formed by the NCDC in the first year under the Cooperative Societies Act,” Swain added. Finding potential in the cooperative sector as a way to boost the income of the farmers and fishers among others to help make them self-reliant, the Modi Government has recently set up a new Ministry called the Ministry of Cooperation. The Laxmanrao Inamdar National Academy for Cooperative Research and Development and Regional Training Centre of NCDC have conducted series of awareness and training programmes for fisher-men and women across the country at state and district level during the current year, said the statement.
2021 The Pioneer.