The Hindu Business Line : Medicinal plants mission to allocate funds to States on demand basis

Chennai, Aug. 15 Disbursal among States of the approved 11th Plan outlay of Rs 630 crore for effectively propagating the new National Mission on Medicinal Plants (NMMP) of the Government will be strictly ‘demand-driven’, and not on the basis of pre-determined allocation.

In short, the potential States will have to vie with each other through various developmental plans and programmes for cultivation, processing and marketing of medicinal plants to get a bigger share of the funds.

The Central contribution would be 100 per cent during the 11th Plan period, and the States’ contributions may be suitably enhanced during the 12th Plan, following a mid-review of the scheme. Funds for implementing the scheme, after approval of the Standing Financing Committee, will be directly released to State Medicinal Plants Boards registered as Society. An MoU will be signed with the State governments for this purpose.

Talking to Business Line here at the sidelines of a stakeholder meet on ‘Road map for medicinal plants cultivation in Tamil Nadu’, organised by the State Medicinal Plants Board, Mr B.S. Sajwan, CEO of National Medicinal Plants Board, (under the Ministry of Health), said the key objective was to identify medicinal plants clusters throughout the country for producing raw material of quality and standardised constituents for use by the Ayush products sector. He said the plan was to engage the herbal products sector and the farmers for enhancing the quality of Ayush systems of medicine and promote export of value-added items. Suggesting that continuous farmer-industry interaction was necessary for the success of the NMPP, Mr Sajwan said the strategy would involve adoption of an end-to-end approach covering production, post-harvest management, processing and marketing. “This will be achieved by promoting cultivation of medicinal plants in identified clusters/zones within selected districts of States having potential for medicinal plants cultivation.” He said efforts would be made to provide linkages with regard to production and supply of quality planting material, processing, quality testing, certification, warehousing and marketing for meeting the demands of the Ayush industry and for value-added exports.

Convinced that it was possible to offer remunerative prices to the growers/farmers through processing, marketing and testing, he said the NMMP also seeks to promote medicinal plants as a crop alternative to the farmers. Pointing out that NMMP will have a two-tier structure — national and State — Mr Sajwan said at the national level, it will be headed by Union Health and Family Welfare. He said the Mission by 2011-12 expects to bring some 80,000-1,00,000 hectares of land under medicinal plants through direct financial assistance for cultivation, and an almost equal area which will be covered by incentivisation of farmers who may switch over from traditional crops to medicinal plants. Some 200 nurseries are proposed to be set up, both in the public and private sector, for making available seeds of certified quality.

New testing laboratories will be created through public-private partnerships. According to Mr Sajwan, export of medicinal and value-added products from India was expected to double from the present Rs 800-900 crore, by 2011-12.