Why in news? e-NAM initiative of Ministry of Agriculture won Platinum Award in the Digital Empowerment of Citizens Category in Digital India Award 2022

Highlights

• Platform of Platforms (PoPs) under e-NAM, a digital ecosystem has been created that leverages the expertise of individual service platforms across various segments of Agri value chain.
• This digital platform integrating 1260 APMC mandis across 22 States and 3 UTs to facilitate online trading of 203 agriculture and horticulture commodities to enable farmers to realize better remunerative prices for their produce

About e-NAM

• Online trading platform for agricultural commodities in India
• Parent Organization: Ministry of Agriculture
• Aim : Better price discovery and providing facilities for smooth marketing of produce
• Portal managed by Small Farmers’ Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC)
• Digital payments partner: Kotak Mahindra Bank, Indusland bank

How is it helping ?

• It is providing access to prevailing commodity price on mobile app, GPS based feature capturing e-NAM mandis and mandi prices within ~100 kms radius
• Route map, Advance lot registration, SMS alert on final bid price of the lot & payment receipt, Real time competitive price bidding through e-NAM portal helps in transparency in pricing
• Weighments integration for accurate weight, bidding progress available on mobile, facilitates direct trade between farmer and trader, direct payment to Farmer’s bank account, reduction in the transaction costs of buyers and sellers, FPO trading module to facilitate FPOs to e-trade through e-NAM
• MIS dashboard, BHIM and other mobile payments, enhanced features on the mobile app such as gate entry and payment through mobile phones and farmers database is helping adoption

About Digital India Award

• Instituted by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, under the aegis of National Portal of India
• Mission: To encourage and honour innovative digital solutions/ exemplary initiatives by various government entities in the realm of Digital Governance.
• Aims to inspire and motivate not only government entities but also startups in fulfilling the Digital India vision.
• Categories: 07 different categories viz. Digital Empowerment of Citizens, Public Digital Platforms, Digital Initiatives in Collaboration with Start-ups, Digital Initiative for ease of doing business, Data sharing and use for socioeconomic development, Digital Initiatives at Grassroots level, Best Web & Mobile initiatives etc.