Focus: GS III: Agriculture
Why in News?
Recently, a meeting was held by the Union Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare for the Horticulture Cluster Development Programme (CDP).
About Horticulture Cluster Development Programme
- It is a central sector programme aimed at growing and developing identified horticulture clusters to make them globally competitive.
- Horticulture cluster is a regional/geographical concentration of targeted horticulture crops.
- It is implemented by the National Horticulture Board (NHB) of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare.
- The states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, West Bengal, Manipur, Mizoram, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand etc. will also be included in the list of 55 clusters, identified with their focus/main crops.
- Earlier, in pilot phase, it was implemented in 12 clusters covering 11 States/UTs.
- Cluster Development Programme has a great potential to transform the entire horticulture ecosystem by creating last-mile connectivity with the use of multimodal transport for efficient and timely evacuation and transportation of horticulture produce.
Objectives:
- The CDP aims to improve exports of targeted crops by about 20% and create cluster-specific brands to enhance the competitiveness of cluster crops.
- To address all major issues related to the Indian horticulture sector including pre-production, production, post-harvest management, logistics, marketing and branding.
- To leverage geographical specialisation and promote integrated and market-led development of horticulture clusters.
- To converge with other initiatives of the Government such as the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund.
- A lot of investment will also come in the horticulture sector through CDP.
