Agribusiness & Rural Environment
Agribusiness and Rural Environment
Introduction
National Agriculture Market (NAM) is a pan-India electronic trading portal which networks the existing APMC mandis to create a unified national market for agricultural commodities.The NAM Portal provides a single window service for all APMC related information and services. This includes commodity arrivals & prices, buy & sell trade offers, provision to respond to trade offers, among other services. While agriculture produce flow continues to happen through mandis, an e-market which reduces transaction costs and information asymmetry. Agriculture marketing is administered by the different States as per their agri-marketing regulations, under which, the State is divided into several market areas, each of which is administered by a separate Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) which imposes its own marketing regulations (including fees).
NAM creates a unified market through online trading platform, both, at State and National level and promotes uniformity, streamlining of procedures across the integrated markets, removes information asymmetry between buyers and sellers and promotes real time price discovery, based on actual demand and supply, promotes transparency in auction process, and access to a nationwide market for the farmer, with prices commensurate with quality of his produce and online payment and availability of better quality produce and at more reasonable prices to the consumer.
The Market
On this e-NAM platform, farmers can opt to trade directly on their own through mobile app or through registered commission agents.The e-NAM is linked with 585 markets (APMCs) in 16 states and 2 union territory, with over 45 lakh farmer membership in 15 states. The market is helping traders and exporters in procuring quality produce in bulk, at one place and ensure transparent financial transactions.The Government plans to connect over 22,000 GrAMs, local farmers markets, with this platform. To provide better grading and assaying services, the Agriculture Department is looking in partnership with AGMARK for better certification.WORKING OF E-NAM.
Stakeholders farmers
NAM promises more options for selling produce and making competitive returns.Traders: NAM will provide access to larger national market for secondary trading.Buyers, Processers & Exporters: NAM will enable direct participation in the local mandi trade, reducing intermediation cost.Mandis: There are a lot of benefits to the Mandis in the National Agriculture Markets. They are, Reduction in book keeping, Better monitoring, Analysis and forecasting of the arrivals and prices, auctioning process takes place through the system, manpower requirement is reduced.
Objectives of E-nam
A national e-market platform for transparent sale transactions and price discovery in regulated markets. Willing States can act accordingly enact suitable provisions in their APMC Act for promotion of e-trading by their State Agricultural Marketing Board/APMC.
Liberal licensing of traders / buyers and commission agents by State authorities without any pre-condition of physical presence or possession of shop /premises in the market yard.
One license for a trader valid across all markets in the State.
Harmonisation of quality standards of agricultural produce and provision for assaying (quality testing) infrastructure in every market to enable informed bidding by buyers. Common tradable parameters have so far been developed for 90 commodities.
Single point levy of market fees, i.e on the first wholesale purchase from the farmer.
Provision of Soil Testing Laboratories in/ or near the selected mandi to facilitate visiting farmers to access this facility in the mandi itself.
Constraints in E-namn Equipment
E-NAM platform is not fully functional in any State. There are no scientific sorting/grading facilities or quality testing machines. Lack of internet connectivity is another issue impeding progress.Tardy progress: Market remains isolated, with traders from outside the APMC not being able to buy farmers produce from the mandi and buyers have to physically inspect quality.Delay in implementation: State agricultural departments have been finding difficulties to convince all stakeholders — farmers, traders and commission agents — to move to the online platform. While traders fear the taxman, farmers fear lower prices if the produce is assayed. Lack of technical expertise at the State Agricultural Departments has also delayed the setting up of grading/assaying facilities, say officials from the mandis.RESEARCH BUREAU: The e-NAM portal was launched by the govn. in April 2016, has 45.4 lakh farmers and 417 mandis across the country registered with it. This number is disappointing, because there are more than 13 crore farmers in India.
Features Added in E-nam Reboot
The eNAM website is now available in Gujarati, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali and Odia, besides Hindi and English, while the eNAM trading facility is available in six languages.
479 regulated wholesale mandis have been integrated with eNAM across 14 States and two union territory. And the target is to link 585 mandis by the end of the year.
e-NAM portal provides for online payment to farmers through RTGS/NEFT, debit card and internet banking.
E-Learning module in Hindi has also been incorporated in the website so that various stakeholders can learn about how to operate the system and continuously get trained at their convenience.
The MIS dashboard has been introduced to provide a greater insight into the performance of each mandi in terms of arrival and trade.
To ensure timely payment to farmers after auctioning of commodities on the platform, the government has introduced Unified Payment Interface (UPI) facility through BHIM.
Besides making the eNAM mobile app multilingual, the government has introduced a facility for mandi operators to carry out one of the critical operations of ‘Gate Entry’ directly from the app. Farmers can also see the real-time bidding progress and assaying certificates through app.
