National Agriculture Market (eNAM) is an all-India electronic trading portal that links existing APMC mandis to generate a unified national market for agricultural commodities. The Small Farmers Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC) is the principal agency implementing eNAM under the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare, Government of India’s guidance.
The Platform of Platforms (PoP) under e-NAM
The Platform of Platforms (PoP) was recently launched by the Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare at the State Agriculture and Horticulture Ministers’ Conference in Bengaluru, Karnataka. It incorporates the platform of Service Providers as “Platform of Platforms” and includes various types of service providers like Composite Service Providers, Logistics Service Provider, Quality Assurance Service Providers and much more.
Benefits of the Platform of Platforms (PoP)
The PoP aims to increase farmers’ digital access to multiple markets, buyers, and service providers. It brings transparency to business transactions with the goal of improving the price search mechanism and realizing quality commensurate prices. The PoP will create a digital ecosystem that will benefit from different platforms’ expertise in the agricultural value chain’s various segments.
Ease of Operation through PoP
With 41 service providers from different platforms covered under POP, various value chain services like trading, quality checks, warehousing, fintech, market information, transportation, and others are facilitated. Different stakeholders such as farmers, FPOs, traders, and others can access a wide array of goods and services across the agricultural value chain through a single window.
Understanding the e-NAM Portal
The e-NAM portal is a pan-India electronic trading platform that connects existing APMC mandis to form a consolidated national market for agricultural commodities. The aim is to promote uniformity in agriculture marketing by streamlining the procedures across the integrated markets and remove information asymmetry between buyers and sellers.
Vision and Mission of e-NAM
The vision of e-NAM is to promote uniformity in agricultural marketing by streamlining procedures across the integrated markets, removing information asymmetry between buyers and sellers, and promoting real-time price discovery based on actual demand and supply. Its mission is to integrate APMCs across the nation through a common online market platform, providing better price discovery through a transparent auction process based on the quality of produce and timely online payment.
Other Initiatives for Agriculture
Apart from e-NAM, several other initiatives have been put forth to boost the realm of Agriculture in India. These include AgriStack, Digital Agriculture Mission, Unified Farmer Service Platform (UFSP), National e-Governance Plan in Agriculture (NeGP-A), Sub-Mission on Agricultural Mechanization (SMAM), Kisan Suvidha App, Soil Health Card (SHC) Portal amongst many others.
UPSC Civil Services Examination, Previous Year Questions (PYQs)
In 2017, one of the questions asked was about the benefits of implementing the ‘National Agriculture Market’ scheme. The answer elaborates that NAM provides a pan-India electronic trading portal for agricultural commodities, making it a unified market and ensuring the farmers nationwide access to a market, with prices commensurate with the quality of their produce.
