| | APRIL 20229A `FARMER CONNECT PORTAL' HAS BEEN SET-UP FOR PROVIDING A PLATFORM TO THE FARMERS, FPOS OR FPCS, AND COOPERATIVES TO INTERACT WITH THE EXPORTERSthe second year in a row. Despite facing tremendous supply side issues, coffee exports have crossed $1 billion for the first time, which has improved reali-zations for coffee growers in Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu", it said.The Ministry said that this achievement is the re-sult of sustained efforts on the part of the Depart-ment of Commerce and its various export pro-motion agencies like APEDA, MPEDA and various commodity boards. "The Depart-ment has made special efforts to engage state governments and district admin-istrations in promoting agricultural exports. In order to ensure that the farmers benefit from exports, the Department of Commerce has made special efforts to provide export market linkage directly to farmers and FPOs. A `Farmer Connect Portal' has been set-up for providing a platform to the farmers, FPOs or FPCs, and coop-eratives to interact with the export-ers. This approach has resulted in agriculture exports taking place from hitherto unexplored areas", the Ministry said.The statement also said that exports have taken place from clusters like Varanasi (fresh vegetables, mangoes), Ananthpur (banana), Nagpur (orange), Lucknow (mango), Theni (banana), Solapur (pome-granate), Krishna and Chittoor (mango), among others. "Initiatives like `Happy Ba-nana' train, an exclusive train with reefer containers to trans-port bananas from Anantapur to JNPT, Mumbai, have been taken to boost exports from unconventional areas", it said.In addition, the Ministry said that the out-break of the Covid-19 pandemic during the first quarter of 2020 resulted in in-creased demand for staples, which provided an opportunity for in-creasing agriculture exports. "Because of the institutional framework already in place at the state and district levels, and the special efforts made to overcome the pandem-ic-induced bottlenecks, India has been able to rise to the oc-casion and emerge as a reliable supplier of food. Even during the current crisis triggered by the Rus-sia­Ukraine war, the world is looking at India for supplies of wheat and other food grains", the statement said.
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