Bhubaneswar: The state frequently failed to spend funds allocated to Odisha from the Tribal Ministry in the form of Minimum Support Price (MSP) or for marketing forest produce, claims government statistics.
Under the ‘Mechanism for Marketing of Minor Forest Produce (MFP) through Minimum Support Price and Development of Value Chain for MFP’, the Tribal Ministry assists states to procure minor forest produce and create storage facilities for the products.
The states are expected to procure notified minor forest produce in case the market price falls below the notified MSP. The rules mandate use of the funds to boost infrastructure in those areas to help procurement and facilitate sale of the forest produce with the help of local markets.
However, the statistics available with the Tribal Ministry which was submitted to the Lok Sabha indicated the Odisha government had failed to utilise the full fund meant to assist tribals and other traditional forest dwellers.
As per figures, Central funds given to Odisha for procurement of minor forest produce in the previous years remained under-utilised while tribals and OTFDs were forced to sell their minor forest produce at lower prices than the MSP under distress conditions.
The data claims Odisha was sanctioned Rs 40 crore for 2013-14 but the state had spent Rs 0.73 crore. There was no sanction in 2014-15 while in 2015-16 the state received Rs 9.91 crore but it could utilize only Rs 0.36 crore.
No data was available for 2016-17 (till April 25, 2016) fiscal while the state was provided Rs 8.20 crore in 2014-15 for cold storages, warehousing and other infrastructure for MFP but utilisation data from the state is not available.
The Central scheme on MSP is meant to ameliorate the condition of the tribals, but tribal rights activists claim that the state procurement agencies in Odisha were reluctant to reach out to the beneficiaries.
Y Giri Rao, a tribal rights expert, told Orissa POST, “More than 50 per cent of tribals in Odisha are landless. A large number of them are dependent on minor forest produce. There have been demands for hike in MSP besides clamour for support to supplementary infrastructure such as cold storages and processing units but the state has not been able to do the needful for the tribals.”
An SC and ST Department official said the department could not extend the needed help to the tribals or through the MSP when they receive complaints of distress sale situations from the Gram Sabhas.
PNN