Shillong: The Meghalaya government has doubled the upper limit for interest-free working capital provided to cooperatives to Rs 1 crore and is planning to set up 200 collective marketing centres in the next financial year.

The government is currently working with a network of 500 collectives, including cooperative societies, Farmer Producer Organisations and village organisations to provide decentralised agri-marketing support. At each production cluster, a collective marketing centre comprising an aggregation cum mini-processing facility is being constructed for handing over to a local collective.

The state already has 200 collective marketing centres which produce turmeric, ginger, pepper, areca nut, cashew, broom grass and potatoes. The government will handhold and strengthen these centres in the current fiscal.

Besides, PRIME Hubs, which will be higher-level aggregation and processing centres, are operational in five locations and another 20 are being constructed with an investment of Rs 88 crore.

All the agri-marketing initiatives will be primarily implemented through the Megha-LAMP programme and the government has earmarked Rs 240 crore for 2023-24.

To give further fillip to the primary sector, the state government will set up a state-of-the-art food testing laboratory in Upper Shillong with and investment of Rs 27 crore. The centre, which is likely to be completed in 2024-25, will enable testing of food produce. This will help increase the products’ marketability and export potential.

An amount of Rs 10 crore has also been allocated to build a new tissue culture laboratory to ensure the availability of high-quality planting material.

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