The Government is implementing Agricultural Marketing Infrastructure (AMI), a sub-scheme of Integrated Scheme for Agricultural Marketing (ISAM) under which assistance is provided for construction/ renovation of godowns/ warehouses in the rural areas in the States to enhance the storage capacity for agriculture produce. Under the scheme, Government provides subsidy at the rate of 25% and 33.33% on capital cost of the project based on the category of eligible beneficiary. Assistance is available to Individuals, Farmers, Group of farmers/growers, Agri-preneurs, Registered Farmer Produce Organizations (FPOs), Cooperatives, and state agencies etc. The scheme is demand driven.

 

Since 01.04.2001 and up to 30.09.2021, a total of 40,985 storage infrastructure projects (Godowns), with storage capacity of 708.67 Lakh MT for beneficiaries including farmers have been assisted under AMI sub-scheme in the country which includes 3669 projects in Maharashtra and 1195 projects in Tamil Nadu. The State wise details of number of applications received and number of projects of beneficiaries assisted including farmers with storage capacity is at Annexure-I.

 

Further, Government has approved a new central sector scheme of financing facility viz., Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF) of Rs. 1,00,000 Crore to provide a medium-long term loan facility for investment in viable projects for post-harvest market infrastructure including warehousing facility and community farming assets through interest subvention and financial support. AIF provides financial support in terms of Interest Subvention and Credit Guarantee on loans for post harvest management projects like Warehouses, Cold Chains, Silos etc. and building community farming asset projects. Under the scheme, loans are provided by banks and financial institutions to Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS), Marketing Cooperative Societies, Farmer Producers Organizations (FPOs), Self Help Groups (SHGs), Farmers, Joint Liability Groups (JLG), Multipurpose Cooperative Societies, Agri-entrepreneurs, Startups and Central/State agency or Local Body sponsored Public Private Partnership Project. All loans under this financing facility have interest subvention of 3% per annum up to a limit of Rs.2 crore. This subvention is available for a maximum period of 7 years. Further, credit guarantee coverage is available for eligible borrowers from this financing facility under Credit Guarantee Fund Trust for Micro and Small Enterprises (CGTMSE) scheme for a loan up to Rs. 2 crore.