Nafed to provide market linkages to Punjab potato farmers

The National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation (Nafed) on Wednesday said it would soon facilitate selling of potatoes in Punjab to avoid farmers making distress sales. The federation is finalising modalities with the state government, and most likely will start providing market linkages to farmers this week, it said.

Farmers in Punjab are resorting to distress sale due to excess production this year. They are selling at as low as ~2-3 per kg. “We will facilitate wherever they (Punjab farmers) want to sell, in the Delhi market or states where there is deficit,” Sanjeev Kumar Chadha, managing director of Nafed, told PTI. The cooperative will not invest but work with the state government. The market linkages will be facilitated if the state government gives transport subsidy of ~2 per kg to farmers, he said.

Nafed is working on three ways to help Punjab farmers.

One is that farmers can get their produce to Delhi’s Azadpur mandi and the cooperative will help them sell through the auction process. Another option is to facilitate market linkages in deficit states and the third is cold storage chain facilities, the Nafed official said.

Nafed is applying this model and helping the Gujarat government to dispose off potato and tomato.

Recently, the Odisha government has sought help of the cooperative for selling tomato.