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MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government is coming out with a scheme that would allow/encourage housing societies to allot space in their societies for farmers to sell their produce, a move that will cut middlemen’s profits and ensure that farmers get better prices for their efforts.The state believes that this will be a win-win prospect for the people as they would get farmers’ products at cheaper rates, while farmers too would also get better prices as middlemen would be eliminated.In the next couple of days, the state government will be coming out with a government resolution that will spell out how the policy would be rolled out.According to state government officials, there are three ways the scheme is being rolled out. In the first instance, housing societies will have to allow at least a 100 square feet of space where self-help groups (SHGs), agro producers, farmer producer organisations (FPOs) can supply their products, and it will be up to the societies to manage and sell vegetables either to their members or to those from outside their society.In the second option, the society can allot space and charge a nominal rent, and the SHGs, FPOs will be able to run these stalls.While the third case will allow for a retail van, managed by SHGs or other NGOs, to come and deliver according to the needs of the housing societies.State co-operation department officials said that the project is going to be rolled out in urban areas in Mumbai, Thane, Pune, Navi Mumbai, Nashik and Nagpur. “We have already held a meeting with 100 housing societies in Mumbai on June 28 and more than 80% of them were happy to make space in their societies for this initiative,” said a state cooperative department official.State cooperative minister Subhash Deshmukh told ET that this would benefit both the farmer as well as the consumer. “This initiative will ensure that farmers get higher prices for their products, and the consumer who had to buy these products at higher prices will now be able to get them at reasonable rates,” said Deshmukh.Officials said that this was an extremely necessary step as the high prices were not doing any good to the farmers or consumers. “If a farmer sells his onion to a trader at ?10 a kg, by the time it reaches the consumer, it is sold for no less than ?24 a kg. With this initiative, the farmer will get a higher price, while the consumer will also be able to buy at reasonable rates,” said a cooperative department official.