Telangana government to set up rice mills in every district: KCR

The Telangana government has decided to set up rice mills and food processing units in every district to convert Paddy into various products such as rice bran oil, apart from rice, and help the farmers in getting open market prices for their crops.
The government would set up modern and technologically advanced rice mills to process 60 tons and 120 tons of rice per hour in each district.

Chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao held a meeting with the representatives of Japan’s Satake corporation, on Monday night. Telangana which had already reached top in Paddy production in the country, should be able to produce Paddy products in the global market and earn more profits through the food processing industries, CM KCR said.

“To encourage food processing industries, rice mills will be established and maintained under the supervision of Telangana State Civil Supplies Corporation. As there is a demand for various types of products made from rice in the global market, the Corporation will also undertake the responsibility of expanding the market. Rice bran oil production mills will be established and linked to rice mills,” KCR said.

He said more number of godowns would be constructed to keep the increasing rice stocks safe and directed civil supplies minister Gangula Kamalakar and officials to prepare specific plans on this.

“The government has the responsibility to ensure that the harvested crop is not wasted, or damaged and the prices should not be reduced due to any reason. Paddy production in the state has reached more than 3 crore tons and surpassed Punjab. The Paddy yield is expected to increase further in the state. At present, the capacity of rice mills in the state to convert paddy into rice through CMR milling is not more than 75 lakh tonnes. As a result, the paddy stocks are increasing in the mills and there is no storage space for the next crop. There is a huge difference between the harvested crop and the capacity of the rice mills,” KCR said.

The CM said he would soon lay the foundation stone for this huge project which will cost more than Rs 2,000 crores pertaining to the food processing unit.

This article has been republished from The Times of India