Official apathy uproots investor interest at Govt’s "Agro Advantage" meet

The alliance government also offered a record 53 projects in the areas of seeds, bio-technology, fertiliser, pesticides, horticulture, dairy, fisheries, poultry, meat and meat products, sericulture, sugar co-generation power projects and agricultural infrastructure.

Of these, seven were from the government sector and 46 from the private sector — worth Rs 5,500 crore. On the concluding day of the convention onNovember 9, Agriculture Minister Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil was non-committal on actual investments, while speaking to mediapersons.

Vikhe Patil merely said a section of investors evinced keen interest in the new projects and the alliance government expected them to participate in the next few months. “We received specific response only for the sugar co-generation power projects,” Vikhe Patil said.

Investors, who had come from New Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan as well as Maharashtra, were shocked at the indifference shown by top bureaucrats involved in the convention.

“The intention of the alliance government was praiseworthy, but we feel that the convention failed to achieve the desired objective, owing to the casual approach of top bureaucrats,” Anand Sachdeo, Project Coordinator (India), US Grain Council, told The Indian Express.

Sachdeo said there ought to be a one- window system for investors and the state government abolish the Agriculture Land Ceiling Act, but officials werenon-committal’ on both. Another investor from New Delhi said, on condition of anonymity, said gross mismanagement and poor planning had prevented the government from making the best of the convention.

“During the four-day convention, we hoped that officials at the helm of affairs would organise one-to-one meetings between investors and project proponents,” he said, but saw, instead, the meet being dominated by ministers’ speeches, that too, in Marathi. “As a result,” he added, “the alliance government could not make a specific commitment on any of the projects it offered.”

The investor also said the officers demonstrated a clear lack of interest.’ “Joshi and Vikhe Patil took the lead, but the zeal and enthusiasm was not reflected in the officials,” he added.

The investor said he had taken up the one-to-one meeting issue with the secretaries of both departments, but they expressed their inability to help him, citing shortage of time.’ If “this is the attitude of the bureaucrats, it is betterthat such conventions are not organised in future,” he observed.

Officials of the newly-established Shivaji Estates, Livestock and Farms (SELF) were equally disappointed. A senior official claimed that following an official communication from Vikhe Patil, SELF had submitted four projects worth Rs 85 crore. However, the projects were presented by the state-run MITCON. “In the booklet circulated by MITCON, there was a mention of our projects, but no credit was given to us. They had printed our projects, along with the spelling mistakes committed by us!” the official said.

He added that despite the fact that all the projects his firm offered were profit-oriented, there was no response from investors, owing to the lack of professional management. “Despite our persistent demand, top officials failed to organise our meeting with the investors. As a result, there was no response to us,” the official pointed out.

In addition, the alliance government had promised financial assistance to agencies foragriculture business information, air freight subsidy, an export incentive to non-traditional markets and the setting up of a state agriculture commission to chalk out a plan for the development of agriculture and allied sectors on a long-term basis.

The highlights were allotment of surplus land with government seed farms and agricultural universities to investors for joint ventures on a 30- year basis, an incentive for pre-cooling units and cold storages, reduction in frequency of license renewal and property tax holiday for green houses.modern facilities for quality standard testing, area reservation for agro industries in the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation estates, concessional power tariff for high-tech agricultural ventures, pre-cooling and cashewnut processing units.