Part 1

CII organised a Pre-event in support of the UN Food Systems Summit 2021, National Food Processing Conclave 2020, on 23 November 2020: Virtual Platform. The summit aimed  to provide a platform for ambitious new actions, innovative solutions, and plans to transform food systems and leverage these shifts to deliver progress across all of the SDGs and will pursue five specific objectives in support of its broader vision of delivering progress on all 17 SDGs. The summit focused on raising global awareness and shape global commitments that can transform food systems to resolve hunger, reduce diet-related diseases and restore the planetary health. CII as the regional partner organised the sessions on Game Changing Innovations from India, session on Food systems in India and the way forward. A special session on Emerging Trends in the Food processing industry was also organized.

A Special session on Food Systems in India and the way forward was Chaired by Dr Martin Frick, Deputy to the Special Envoy, for the UN Food Systems Summit 2021 and aimed at discussing new pathways of convergence that need to be in place and highlights the need to prioritise food system reforms in our “build forward” agenda, as we make concrete inroads toward the Sustainable Development Goals - SDG’s, that can transform  -  food supply chains to become more resilient, provide healthy and safe diets, access to good nutrition and encourage Regenerative farming, as we shift to sustainable consumption patterns. The high powered panel for the session included Secretaries to the Government of India from the Ministry of Food Processing Industries, Ministry of Food and Public Distribution, Special Secretary, Logistics – Ministry of Commerce and industry CEOs from ITC, Nestle and HUL.

Dr Martin Frick, Deputy to the Special Envoy, for the UN Food Systems Summit 2021,United Nations said that we need an action-oriented approach as we move forward, Globally as well as in India we need to help support micro business for essential livelihood, bring new opportunity to  India and giving access to people to do new  research and development. He highlighted that in the pandemic our first line of defence is healthy nutrition which can help us in striving planetary health. 

Mr. Sudhanshu Pandey – Secretary, Department of Food and Public Distribution, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Government of India spoke about one nation one ration card which is the technologically enabled end to end  supply chain solution to tackle the issue of malnutrition & making food available at affordable prices, which aims to cover 810 million people by 2022.

Ms Pushpa Subrahmanyam, Secretary, Ministry of Food Processing Industries, Government of India shared that as far as the Food industry is concerned – a large part of food industry in India is in micro and unorganized sector, a tectonic shift is seen in handling the sector with focus on value chain development, focus on reducing wastage , identifying one product in one district from  700 districts, working on quality of products and increasing access to formal markets.  She focused on strategies to focus on reducing wastage, promoting research in packaging on starch based and nano based packaging.

Mr Pawan Agarwal, Special Secretary – Logistics, Ministry of Commerce, Government of India– Shared about the success of the Eat right India movement where 300 – 400 million people have voluntarily enrolled for the program and working closely with under state and national governments. He shared that voluntary fortification of milk and oil has worked as successful intervention in India, far more successful as compared to in any other country in the world.

Mr Suresh Narayanan, Chairman, CII National Committee on Food Processing Industries & Chairman & Managing Director, Nestle India Ltd highlighted that Food price fluctuations will be seen in future and for that India needs to focus on a three pronged approach. -  first regenerative farming, second Resilient food supply, third healthy diet and good nutrition from resilient supply chains.

Mr Sanjiv Puri Chairman, CII National Council on Agriculture; and Chairman ITC Ltd shared that focus on will now shift on digital infrastructure, and aligning actions to the national priority and  especially on doubling farmers income, productivity and quality need support in India. The focus could be a lot around creating climate smart villages, making agriculture climate resilient and strengthening the FPOs in India.

(Continued in Part 2)