NEW DELHI, October 15 — The Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare on Thursday evening issued expanded operational guidelines for the ₹1-lakh-crore Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF), approving fresh project sanctions worth ₹15,000 crore to construct specialized post-harvest storage and cold-chain logistical assets.
Under the notified parameters, Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS), Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), self-help groups, and agritech startups qualify for a 3 percent annual interest subvention on institutional bank borrowings up to ₹2 crore for a maximum tenure of seven years, supported by fee-free credit risk coverage under the CGTMSE framework.
Agriculture officials noted that modernizing farm-gate aggregation through solar-powered multi-commodity cold rooms, mechanized grading lines, and hermetic silo bags systematically arrests India's perennial 15 to 20 percent post-harvest horticultural perishable wastage, boosting realization margins for small and marginal cultivators.
The statutory and operational mechanics of the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (launched in 2020 under the Atmanirbhar Bharat initiative), the cooperative governance reforms under PACS computerization, the regulatory framework of FPOs under the Companies Act and Cooperative Societies Acts, and the developmental financing mandate of NABARD (established in 1982) represent high-frequency questions in UPSC Civil Services (GS-III: Agriculture & Supply Chain Management) and State PCS exams.