PM Narendra Modi launches National Agriculture Market portal eNAM

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched National Agriculture Market portal eNAM to connect e-mandis in several States.
eNAM is an online inter-connectivity of e-mandis, aimed at ushering in much needed agriculture marketing reforms to enable farmers to get better price of their produce.
Key features

• e-National Agriculture Market (NAM) is a pan-India e-trading platform. It is designed to create a unified national market for agricultural commodities.
• Farmers can showcase their produce online from their nearest market and traders can quote price from anywhere.
• It will result in increased numbers of traders and greater competition. It will also ensure open price discovery and better returns to farmers.
• During the launch, 21 mandis from eight states were connected to this unified portal. The States include Gujarat, Rajasthan, Jharkahnd, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
• Initially, online trade will be allowed within the state and inter-state trade will be possible once all states and mandis are integrated.
• 25 commodities including onion, potato, apple, wheat, pulses, coarse grains and cotton, have been identified for online trading.
• To integrate a wholesale mandis across the country with the online platform, the state governments have to amend their Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC) Act.

eNAM will be implemented in different phases with an aim to integrate 585 regulated markets across the country with the common e-market platform by March 2018. So far 365 mandis from 12 states have been granted approval.

Month: Current Affairs - April, 2016