Theme: Agri-business

Launch: April 14, 2016

Location: Pan-India

Stakeholders: Government of India, farmers, traders, buyers, processors and exporters

Overview

National Agriculture Market (NAM) is a pan-India electronic trading portal that has been set up to network the existing Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC) mandis and effectively create a unified national market for agricultural produce. NAM provides a single window service for all APMC-related information and services, including commodity arrivals & prices, buy & sell trade offers and provision to respond to trade offers.

APMC is a statutory market committee constituted by a State Government in respect of trade in certain notified agricultural or horticultural or livestock products, under the Agricultural Produce Market Committee Act issued by that state government. States have several market areas, with each being governed by its respective APMC. These ensure that farmers are able to get the best possible market-determined prices through the auction method.

Benefits of an online platform include a national market for transparent business transactions, liberal licensing for traders, buyers and commission agents, license validity across all markets in the state, harmonisation of quality standards, provision of quality testing infrastructure, single point levy of market fees, soil testing laboratories in or in proximity to the selected mandi for the benefit of visiting farmers. As of June 2018, common tradable parameters have been developed for 90 commodities.

Currently (as of June 2018), NAM is being leveraged across 585 regulated wholesale markets in states or union territories that have agreed to join the platform. It is being operated by the Small Farmers’ Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC) is operating the NAM as the implementing agency.

Overall Impact:

• It is observed that fragmentation of markets, even within states, hampers the free flow of agri commodities from one market area to another, leading to multiple handling of agri-produce, multiple levels of mandi charges and escalation in prices for consumers without commensurate benefits for the farmers.
• By creating a unified market, NAM promotes uniformity, streamlining of procedures, removal of information asymmetry, real time price discovery, transparency, access to a nationwide market for farmers, prices commensurate with quality of produce, online payment, better quality produce and also more reasonable prices for consumers.
• NAM currently covers 585 markets across 16 states and 2 union territories.
• More than 87.5 lakh farmers and sellers are registered on e-NAM. Over 16.53 crore quintals of farm commodities worth Rs 41,855 crore have been transacted on the platform as of March 31, 2018.

Last updated: August, 2018