The Union Cabinet has approved strengthening the cooperative movement in the country and deepening its reach up to the grassroots. The ministry of cooperation, under the guidance of Home and Cooperation Minister Amit Shah, has formulated a plan to establish viable PACS in each uncovered panchayat, viable dairy cooperatives in each uncovered panchayat/village and viable fishery cooperatives in each coastal panchayat/village as well as panchayat/village having large water bodies, and strengthen the existing PACS/dairy/fishery cooperatives through the convergence of various schemes of the ministry of fisheries, animal husbandry and dairying by leveraging the ‘whole-of-government’ approach.
Initially, 2 lakh PACS/dairy/fishery cooperatives will be established in the next five years. The action plan for implementation of the project shall be prepared by NABARD, National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) and National Fishery Development Board (NFDB).
This will provide farmers across the country with requisite forward and backward linkages to market their produce, enhance their income, and obtain credit facilities and other services at the village level itself. Those primary cooperative societies which cannot be revived will be identified for winding up, and new primary cooperative societies would be established in their area of operation.
The model bye-laws of PACS will enable them to undertake more than 25 business activities which, inter alia, include dairy, fishery, short-term and long-term credit, setting up of godowns, procurement of foodgrains, fertilizers, seeds, LPG/CNG/petrol/diesel distributorship, custom hiring centres, common service centres, fair price shops, community irrigation, business correspondent activities, common service center and so on.
