Union Minister of State for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Giriraj Singh inaugurated the GNFC-KVIC unit for manufacturing organic neem soaps at Bharuch in Gujarat on Thursday.

It has been set up by the State-promoted Gujarat Narmada Valley Fertilizers and Chemicals Ltd (GNFC) under the Prime Minister’s Employment Generation Programme (PMEGP) and supported by Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC).

Second milestone

This is the second milestone in neem-based projects that have empowered 4.5 lakh rural women in the last three years by generating an additional income of ₹45 crore for them by collecting 45,000 tonnes of neem seeds.

GNFC’s CSR arm Narmadanagar Rural Development Society (NARDES) developed the infrastructure for the unit and enabled skill development among women, in accordance with the PMEGP.

NARDES coordinated with KVIC for the institution of the unit, which has a capacity to manufacture 225 tonnes of neem soap worth ₹4.3 crore a year. It also mobilised women and trained them in neem soap making, along with the ITI in Bharuch. They have been certified as soapmakers, according to a press release here.

Earlier, GNFC had implemented a project of 100 per cent neem-coated urea.

It set up the soap unit in a record time of three months, partially funded by a grant of ₹24 lakh under the PMEGP, said Rajiv Kumar Gupta, Managing Director, GNFC.

Neem project

The neem project has been active in 53 districts across 5,000 villages in six States. GNFC also partnered with IFFCO and the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, among others, to carry forward the work of women empowerment, he added.

GNFC, a joint sector enterprise promoted by the State government and Gujarat State Fertilizers and Chemicals Ltd (GSFC), was set up in Bharuch in 1976 and started its manufacturing and marketing operations by setting up the world’s largest single-stream ammonia-urea fertiliser complex.

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