Food Processing Minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal on Monday interacted with promoters of cold chain projects in Maharashtra and discussed the impact on their businesses due to the coronavirus-forced lockdown.
In the deliberation held through video conferencing, among the issues discussed were: piling of stocks of frozen vegetables and dairy products because of reduced demand in the domestic market and difficulty in exports.
The virtual interaction was attended by 38 promoters of the completed 'Integrated Cold Chain Projects' supported by the Ministry of Food Processing in Maharashtra. Minister of State for Food Processing Rameshwar Teli was also present in the meeting, an official statement said.
Badal discussed with them the adverse impact of lockdown on operations, raw material availability and its high cost, labour and logistics issues, and high inventory costs.
The issue of liquidity crunch also featured in the deliberation.
The cold chain promoters talked about the challenges being faced in operations during the lockdown period, it said.
Badal emphasised on the need to leverage the collective strength of the 'Integrated Cold Chain' network to cope with the COVID-19 crisis that has posed a serious challenge to the existing supply chain of food products.
"They discussed issues such as piling stocks of frozen vegetables and processed dairy products not finding their traditional markets like restaurants, banquets, hotels etc amidst the lockdown and further, the difficulty in exporting these products," the statement said.
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