Shiromani Akali Dal leader Harsimrat Kaur Badal retained her portfolio as the Minister of Food Processing Industries in the second innings of the Modi government.

Badal, who scored a hat-trick by winning the Bathinda Parliamentary constituency in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, has been a strong advocate of the government’s decision to allow 100 per cent FDI in retail trading (including through e-commerce) of food products produced in India in 2016.

Key initiatives

Some of the other key initiatives of the Ministry in her previous stint include implementation of Operation Greens scheme to address volatality in prices of tomato, onion and potato, operationalisation of 17 Mega Food Parks and fast-tracking approvals for cold chains.

Besides stepping up its focus on the creation of infrastructure to boost the processing of farm produce to increase farmers’ income, the Ministry may also take up the implementation of Gram Samridhi Yojana, an initiative targeted at unorganised and micro-food processing sector in the coming days.

Investment proposals

The Ministry will also be preparing for the second edition of World Food India, an event organised to attract investment proposals from packaged food companies and increase FDI inflows in the food processing sector.