Krishi Udan Scheme aims at facilitating and incentivising agri-produce movement by air transport
As many as 28 airports under the Airports Authority of India (AAI) have been included in the Krishi Udan Scheme of the Union government, thereby helping more airports facilitate and incentivise the movement of agri-produce by air transport.
The new 28 airports that have been included are Adampur (Jalandhar), Agra, Amritsar, Bagdogra, Bareilly, Bhuj, Chandigarh, Coimbatore, Goa, Gorakhpur, Hindon, Indore, Jaisalmer, Jamnagar, Jodhpur, Kanpur (Chakeri), Kolkata, Nasik, Pathankot, Patna, Prayagraj, Pune, Rajkot, Tezpur, Trichy, Thiruvananthapuram, Varanasi and Visakhapatnam.
Primarily, the scheme had focussed on 25 airports of North-Eastern regions, hilly and tribal regions. The airports that have been already part of the Krishi Udan Scheme are Agartala, Agatti, Barapani, Dehradun, Dibrugarh, Dimapur, Gaggal, Imphal, Jammu, Jorhat, Kullu (Bhuntar), Leh, Lengpui, Lilabari, Pakyong, Pantnagar, Pithoragarh, Port Blair, Raipur, Ranchi, Rupsi, Shimla, Silchar, Srinagar and Tezu. The scheme had looked at enhancement of the existing provisions, mainly focusing on transporting perishable food products from the hilly areas, North-Eastern States and tribal areas.
Krishi Udan aids farmers in transporting agri-produce
Krishi Udan Scheme, which was launched in August 2020 on international and national routes to assist farmers in transporting agricultural products so that it improves their value realization, was later on upgraded as Krishi Udan 2.0 in October 2021. A convergence scheme that has the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Department of Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare, Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, Department of Fisheries, Ministry of Food Processing Industries, Department of Commerce, Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), Krishi Udan has been trying to leverage the existing schemes of these ministries so as to strengthen the logistics for transportation of agri-produce.
Waiver of Landing, Parking, TNLC charges
Facilitating and incentivizing the movement of agri-produce by air transportation by full waiver of Landing, Parking, Terminal Navigational Landing Charges (TNLC), and Route Navigation Facility Charges (RNFC) for Indian freighters and Passenger to Cargo (P2C), the scheme had been running at select airports operating under the Airports Authority of India.
A total of 1,08,479 metric tonnes of perishable cargo – both international and domestic – were handled during the 2021-22 fiscal, till February 28, 2022. This is against the to 84, 042 metric tonnes handled in the 2020-21 fiscal, Gen. V. K. Singh, Minister of State in the Ministry of Civil Aviation, stated in the Rajya Sabha.
