Thanjavur farmers welcome TN's 1st automated direct procurement centre

TIRUCHY: In a first in the State, a highly efficient automated Direct Procurement Centre (DPC) was launched for the farmers in Thanjavur on Saturday, paving the way to tackle the shortcomings in the procurement process.

Inaugurating the DPC at Panchanathikottai in Orathanadu taluk, the Food and Civil Supplies Minister R Sakkarapani said that the DPC, the first of its kind in Tamil Nadu, was established with highly efficient functioning at an estimated cost of Rs 1.41 crore adding that the harvested paddy would be carried to the DPC by tractor or trucks, which would minimise the use of gunny bags.

“To ensure an uninterrupted procurement process, the paddy would be transported to the collection unit with the support of elevators. The collection unit has a capacity of 16 MT,” said the minister.

Stating that the latest infrastructure would certainly mitigate the issues related to pollution, the minister said, paddy would be cleaned at the collection unit with the help of a cyclone dust collector, and it would be transported to the automated weighing machine with the support of a conveyor before being packed at the end point.

“This would reduce wastage during the procurement process. Besides, the high efficiency DPC would procure 15 tonnes per hour and continuously work for a minimum of 10 hours, and thus 150 MT paddy could be procured every day, thus saving farmers’ waiting time,” the minister stressed and added that similar DPCs would be launched in every district.

Meanwhile, the food minister said that the DMK government had increased the MSP for fine varieties of paddy to Rs 2,450 per quintal from Rs 1,960 while the common varieties got Rs 2,045 against Rs 1,905. Similarly, the incentive of Rs 130 for fine variety and Rs 107 for common variety has been disbursed.

“Through these factors, we could procure 6 lakh MT more paddy compared to the previous year. So far, we have procured 27 lakh MT paddy with an average procurement of 62,000 MT paddy per day. Last year, 21 lakh MT was procured,” the minister said.

Minister TRB Rajaa, TNCSC Managing Director A Shanmuga Sundaram, Thanjavur District Collector B Priyanka Pankajam, and others were present.