Nitin Gadkari Nitin Gadkari

UNION MINISTER for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Nitin Gadkari said on Monday that his Ministry was giving special impetus to the ‘village economy’, with an aim to reach Rs 1 lakh crore per annum revenue in the next five years.

He said as part of this programme, manufacturing, processing, packaging and selling village produce such as honey, khadi cloth, papad, and cosmetics would be given impetus.

Talking about the government’s plans to open new markets for sale of honey, Gadkari said he would soon convene a meeting of airlines and request them to provide sachets of honey as an option to refined sugar while serving in-flight hot beverages.

“At present, in flights and five star hotels, tea and coffee are served with sachets of refined sugar. We are planning to introduce honey sachets as a sweetener in five-star hotels and airlines. Soon, I’m going to meet CEOs of Air India, GoAir, IndiGo and SpiceJet to discuss this with them. We want them to give the fliers a choice between sugar and honey,” said Gadkari.

He said that considering calorie consumption, three spoons of sugar are equal to one spoon of honey. He said the government was also trying to promote the use of honey in making of sweets.

Gadkari said boosting honey production enterprise will not only help farmers by giving them an added source of income but will also improve farm yields.

“It’s been proven that apiculture increases agricultural production by about 20 per cent,” said Gadkari. He added the government aims to increase the ‘rural economy’ turnover from the current Rs 1 lakh crore per annum to Rs 5 lakh crore per annum. He said farmers should take up apiculture as an allied farming activity like milk production and poultry.

“We have readied a plan to achieve Rs 5 lakh crore per annum revenue from the village economy. This will be achieved by boosting industries related to bamboo, honey, blue industries, bioethanol and other bio fuels. The growth will also generate jobs for rural youth and reduce the rate of immigration. We have increased the fund allocation for ‘honey clusters’ by ten-fold. We are going to make an offer to those who are already established in the honey business to form clusters. They can involve others in production and packaging to proliferate the enterprise,” said Gadkari.

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