Hafed to set up IOC petrol pumps in Haryana

Chandigarh, July 18: The Haryana State Cooperative Supply and Marketing Federation (Hafed) will set-up Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) petrol pumps in the state, to provide an adequate supply of diesel for the farmers.

These pumps would intially be located at Ladwa, Taraori and Radaur, the main agricultural belt of Haryana.

Hafed also plans to introduce various IT components for e-governance and it would also provide web-enabled services to farmers and customers.

This was disclosed in a meeting of various Co operations of Haryana held here today. The meeting was chaired by state Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

It was also informed that Hafed has floated a special warehousing scheme to enable farmers sell their produce where the market rate would be more remunerative.

Under this scheme the member farmers would be financed to the extent of 80 per cent of the cost of their produce at a concessional interest rate of eight per cent per annum on the basis of warehouse receipt.

Hafed has also decided to upgrade the Rohtak Cattle Feed Plant so as to improve the quality of the feed and make it a brand throughout the country.

At the meeting Mr Hooda stressed the need for diversification of crops and called for ensuring their marketing. He also called upon Hafed to reduce the rate of interest on loans advanced to farmers. The Chief Minister also stressed the need for popularising the use of organic manure among farmers. He said that Hafed had a brand name, so efforts should be made to popularise the use of organic manure by getting supply orders from the big companies.

The meeting was informed that Hafed would construct additional godowns of 95,300 MTs capacity during the current financial year.

Hafed godowns currently have a storage capacity of eight lakh MTs besides having 7.43 MTs capacity of plinths.

The total turnover of Hafed was Rs 2,968 crore during the last year and it had earned a profit of Rs 79.64 crore. The cooperative had procured 37.72 per cent of wheat during last year and 100 per cent procurment of mustard was done by the organisation. Besides it had also purchased 47 per cent of the paddy in Haryana last year.

Hafed sold Kachi Gani, mustard oil worth Rs 13 crore last year and during the current year, the target for sale of mustard oil had been fixed at Rs 17 crore.

The Chief Minister said that Hafed had procured 3.06 lakh MTs of mustard seed during rabi season-2004. He said that a sum of Rs 9.90 crore had been paid to the Cooperative Marketing Societies, so the profit of market societies had increased substantially.

UNI