Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu on Tuesday said the State has finalised the roadmap for implementing the ambitious National Mission on Edible Oils-Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) and it will be implemented soon.
Speaking at the ‘Business Summit for North Eastern States’ on the national mission at Guwahati, he said Arunachal Pradesh, geographically the largest state in North East, has about 1.33 lakh hectares of land feasible for oil palm cultivation as assessed by a central team in 2019.
“Based on the assessment, we have identified the lands, farmers and developers. We will go full swing in implementing the mission very soon,” Khandu said.
He termed the summit as a game-changing platform for the North-East and hailed the Centre for focussing on sectors that would usher accelerated development in the region, according to a CMO statement.
The State already has about 4,250 hectares under oil palm cultivation, the Chief Minister said.
“Farmers didn’t expand their cultivation, saying there were no processing factories while the private companies said without expansion of cultivation sites, establishment of factories wasn’t feasible. This cost an earlier scheme. But under the new National Mission, things have changed. Under it, both our farmers and private investors will be in a win-win situation,” he said.
The Centre has rolled out the NMEO-OP with an outlay of ₹11,040 crore.