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National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd.(NAFED) was established on the auspicious day of Gandhi Jayanti on 2nd October 1958. Nafed is registered under the Multi State Co-operative Societies Act. Nafed was set up with the objective to promote cooperative marketing of agricultural produce to benefit the farmers. Agricultural farmers are the main members of Nafed, who have the authority to say in the form of members of the General Body in the working of Nafed.
Objectives of NAFED
- to facilitate, coordinate and promote the marketing and trading activities of the cooperative institutions, partners and associates in agricultural, other commodities, articles and goods
- to undertake purchase, sale and supply of agricultural, marketing and processing requisites, such as manure, seeds, fertilizer, agricultural implements and machinery, packing machinery, construction requisites, processing machinery for agricultural commodities, forest produce, dairy, wool and other animal products
- to act as warehouseman under the Warehousing Act and own and construct its own godowns and cold storages
- to organize consultancy work in various fields for the benefit of the cooperative institutions in general and for its members in particular
- to undertake manufacture of agricultural, machinery and implements, processing, packing, etc. and other production requisites and consumer articles by setting up manufacturing units either directly or in collaboration
- to maintain transport units of its own or in collaboration with any other organization in India or abroad for movements of goods on land, sea, air and operate freight station and container depot
- to subscribe to the share capital and undertake business collaboration with cooperative institutions, public, joint and private sector enterprises, if considered necessary for fulfilling the objectives of NAFED
- to advance loans to its members and other cooperative institutions on the security of goods or otherwise
More About NAFED
- The management of NAFED vests in the Board of Directors, which includes Chairman and Managing Director. The Board is supported by 2 standing committees – Executive Committee and Business Committee. In addition, the Board can also constitute two more committees/ subcommittees as per the provision of the MSCS Act and bye-laws of NAFED.
- Nafed is one of the central nodal agencies for 16 notified agricultural commodities of oilseeds, pulses and cotton under Price Support Scheme (PSS).
- It is the sole central nodal agency for procurement of milling and ball copra under the Price Support Scheme.
- Apart from providing support to the farmers by way of implementing various schemes of Central Government/ State Governments such as PSS, PSF, MIS etc., Nafed also procures various agricultural commodities directly from farmers at mandi level through cooperative network in its commercial account.
- NAFED has three tier-structure with Nafed at the top of the tier, primary cooperative marketing/ processing societies at the bottom and state level marketing/tribal/commodity federations at the middle. Some national level marketing/ consumer cooperative federations are also members of NAFED.
Source: NAFED website
