NCUI and IFFCO Chairman Dileepbhai Sanghani laid the foundation stone of Honey Plant as well as the Farmers Training Centre at the premises of Amreli District Cooperative Milk Producers Union (AMR Dairy), which is one of the milk unions of GCMMF that sells milk and milk products under the brand name of Amul.
“In a bid to make a small contribution towards the Prime Minister Narendra Modi vision of ushering in the sweet revolution in the country, we have laid the foundation stone for making a honey plant at the premises of AMR Dairy”, said Sanghani on the occasion.
Besides, we are constructing a Farmers Training Centre and Laboratory. The total cost of the project is Rs 12 crore and will be completed in 8 months”, said Sanghani sharing the details to the Indian Cooperative correspondent.
Sanghani said when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Amreli, he announced a fund of Rs 20 crore for setting up the ice-cream plant and a honey farm at the premises of AMR dairy. We got into planning for the same soon after, he added.
“After the announcement of Prime Minister Modi, we started doing work on the project for two years and planted trees at the 35 bigha land. Luckily, we got encouraging results and now here we are, laying the foundation stone for constructing a honey farm which will be a game-changer for the farmers of the area. It would certainly generate additional income”, Sanghani said.
Adding, Sanghani said, “At present also, we are producing the honey but due to lack of laboratory facilities, we send the honey to Anand (Gujarat) laboratory which is more than 200 km far from Amreli district.
But with the operation of a honey farm in our district, everything will come under one roof and we will not have to travel long for laboratory, packaging, and other work. It will also save the cost, he informed.
It bears recall that another major player in the cooperative sector, Nafed is also creating 65 FPOs of beekeepers and is aiming to bring all FPOs with honey production for creating requisite infrastructure under National Beekeeping and Honey Mission.
NDDB, the apex body of dairy co-ops has also in recent times intensified its training programme for bee-keepers.
