The Hindu Business Line : Regulatory body for warehouses in four months: Minister

Giving this information here, Dr Akhilesh Prasad Singh, Union Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, said the process of appointing chairman and two members for the authority was in progress.

He was talking to newspersons on Tuesday on the sidelines of Warehousing 2008, a seminar organised by the department in collaboration with Central Warehousing Corporation (CWC), Food Corporation of India and FICCI to discuss various issues and challenges of the Warehousing (Development & Regulation) Act 2007.

Mr B.B. Pattnaik, Chairman and Managing Director of CWC, explained that the constitution of WDRA was critical for the notification of the Warehousing (Development & Regulation) Act, 2007. Within 30 days of the notification, warehouses had to be registered with WDRA.

“Once private warehouses start getting themselves registered with WDRA, we will have some idea of the warehousing capacity available in the private sector,” he said, pointing out that right now no precise estimate of it was available. CWC, along with State-level warehousing corporation in 17 States, controlled an estimated three million tonnes of capacity, he added.

Storage of foodgrains

Mr Naveen Prakash, Joint Secretary, Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, said it was not mandatory for each warehouse, be it in the private or public sector, to get itself registered with the WDRA but only those registered would be able to issue negotiable warehouse receipts which would be bankable for securing loans. A portion of the capacity of the warehouses registered with WDRA would have to be set aside for the storage of foodgrains and other agriculture commodities, he said.

Under the National Bulk Handling & Storage Policy 2000, he pointed out, Adani Agro Logistics, a private firm, had already set up modern storage facilities of 5.25 lakh tonnes across the country for handling grains on behalf of the Food Corporation of India. FCI too was entering into public-private partnership for storage of food grains for public distribution. The Union Government would allow 100 per cent FDI in warehousing through the automatic route, he said.

The workshops in New Delhi and Chennai on the Warehousing (Development & Regulation) Act, 2007 have come up with some suggestions relating to grading and standardisation, need for use of electronically based negotiable receipts, declaring warehousing as part of the infrastructure so that cheaper credit was available for creating storage facilities, he added.

Mr Naren Dey, West Bengal Minister for Agriculture & Consumer Affairs, emphasised the need for expanding the warehousing network and making cheaper credit available to the rural people.

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Regulatory body for warehouses in four months: Minister

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