The Centre on Friday said it has achieved integration of 1,000 wholesale mandis, located in 21 states and union territories, with the electronic-National Agriculture Market (e-NAM).
While 585 mandis were integrated in the first phase, 415 mandis were integrated in the second phase. The deadline for second phase was May 15.
Right now, farmers auction their agriculture produce at 6,900-odd APMC (Agriculture Produce Marketing Committees) mandis spread across the nation. Some of them are also using online bidding through e-NAM platform.
"38 additional mandis were integrated with the e-NAM platform today, thus achieving a milestone of integration of 415 mandis as per the planned target (for the second phase)," the Agriculture Ministry said in a statement.
The 38 mandis integrated are in Madhya Pradesh (19), Telangana (10), Maharashtra (4), and one each in Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab, Kerala and Jammu and Kashmir, it said.
"With this, the e-NAM platform now has a total number of 1,000 mandis across 18 states and 3 union territories," it added.
e-NAM, which was launched in April 2016, is being implemented by Small Farmers Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC), a central government agency, with the support of state governments.
The purpose of e-NAM is to create a network of existing mandis on a common online market platform as 'One Nation, One Market' for agricultural commodities in India.
More mandis are being integrated in the current COVID-19 situation as the e-NAM platform provides distant bidding facility for wholesale produce in APMC mandis without physical presence of buyer/trader near the auction site for bidding.
The electronic platform also provides e-payment facility through which traders can pay farmers, after the trade is executed, from anywhere, be it home or office, without going to banks, thus avoiding crowds.
To decongest mandis during COVID-19 lockdown situation, the government has launched new features on the e-NAM platform, enabling direct trading from warehouses as well as collection centres of farmers producers organisations (FPOs), besides logistics support.
In the last four years, the ministry said, e-NAM has registered a user base of 1.66 crore farmers, 1.31 lakh traders, 73,151 commission agents and 1,012 farmers producers organisations (FPOs).
As on May 14, farmers have transacted over Rs 1 lakh crore on the eNAM platform with a trade volume of 3.43 crore tonnes of commodities, and 38.16 lakh bamboo and coconuts, it said.
Presently, 150 commodities, including foodgains, oilseeds, fibres, fruits and vegetables, are traded on e-NAM.
The online trading platform provides a single window service for all mandi related information and services, including commodity arrivals, quality assaying, competitive bid offers and electronic payment settlement directly into farmers' accounts, the ministry said.
The online digital market aims at reducing transaction costs, bridging information asymmetries, and helping expansion of market access for farmers and other stakeholders, it added.
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