- These enterprises in turn have generated employment for 19,000 persons
- Maharashtra accounted for the largest number of entrepreneurs with 600
December 19, 2016: Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDII), an acknowledged national resource Institute for Entrepreneurship Education, Research, Training and Institution Building, has created 5,500 entrepreneurs in the food processing sector across 23 states. Through its Entrepreneurship Development Programmes (EDPs), on behalf of the Ministry of Food Processing Industries, Government of India, EDII trained over 11,000 individuals. Out of these, half of them took the entrepreneurial plunge and in the last decade 5500 enterprises have come up in this sector with their own production units and have in turn generated employment for over 19,000 persons.
Maharashtra accounted for the largest number of enterprises with 600 having been set up in the last one decade, followed by Gujarat with 586, Jharkhand with 578, Bihar with 473 and Karnataka with 444 food processing units.
Dr. Sunil Shukla, Director of EDII said, “India is the world’s second largest producer of food and has the potential to acquire the number one status with sustained efforts. The growth of this industry will bring immense benefits to the economy, raising agricultural yields, enhancing productivity, creating employment, and raising life-standards of a large number of people across the country, especially in the rural areas. Given the thrust of the Government of India on the food processing industry, it is imperative that new entrepreneurs are motivated and trained to take up the challenges of the emerging opportunities in the sector.”
Elaborating on the focus of EDII on new enterprise creation in food processing sector, Prof. S. B. Sareen, Faculty & Head-Centre for SMEs & Business Development Services said, “Since 2003-04, EDI has been actively involved in conducting Entrepreneurship Development Programmes (EDP) in various parts of the country – to date around 450 EDPs were conducted across 23 states. Results of conducting these EDPs have been extremely encouraging as large numbers of EDP trained entrepreneurs have started their own businesses as well as production units.”
The enormous growth potential of this sector can be understood from the fact that food production in the country is expected to double in the next 10 years, while the consumption of value-added food products will also correspondingly grow. India with arable land of 184 million hectares, produces 140 million tons of milk per year (highest in the world), 250 million tons of fruits & vegetables (second largest), 512 million livestock (largest), 257 million tons of food grain (third largest), 9.58 million tons fish (third largest), 3.8 million tons of poultry meat a year (third largest) and 65,000 million eggs (second largest).
About EDII (ediindia.org)
Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDII) is an acclaimed International Resource Centre facilitating all facets of Entrepreneurship Development. EDII’s mission is to be a catalyst in facilitating emergence of competent first generation entrepreneurs and transition of existing SMEs into growth-oriented enterprises through entrepreneurship education, training, research & institution building.
EDI’s mission has led to the emergence of several programmes under strategically planned centres to generate awareness, sensitise environment, strengthen institutional linkages and networking and impart training in specialised areas. EDII’s focus areas are: 1) Entrepreneurship Education & Research; 2) Micro Enterprises, Micro Finance and Sustainable Livelihood; 3) SMEs & Business Development Services; 4) Cluster Competitiveness, Growth & Technology; 5) Social Entrepreneurship & CSR; 6) Women Entrepreneurship & Gender Studies.
EDII is an autonomous and not-for-profit institute, set up in 1983, and is sponsored by apex financial institutions – the IDBI Bank Ltd., IFCI Ltd., ICICI Bank Ltd. and the State Bank of India (SBI). The Government of Gujarat pledged twenty-three acres of land on which stands the majestic and sprawling EDI campus. To pursue its mission, EDI has helped set up twelve state-level exclusive entrepreneurship development centres and institutes. One of the satisfying achievements, however, was taking entrepreneurship to a large number of schools, colleges, science and technology institutions and management schools in several states by including entrepreneurship inputs in their curricula.
In the international arena, efforts to develop entrepreneurship by way of sharing resources and organising training programmes, have helped EDI earn accolades and support from the World Bank, Commonwealth Secretariat, UNIDO, ILO, British Council, Ford Foundation, European Union, ASEAN Secretariat and several other renowned agencies. EDI has also set up Entrepreneurship Development Centre at Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam and is in the process of setting up such centres at Uzbekistan and five African countries. In recognition of its international achievements, the United Nations Economic & Social Commission for Asia and Pacific (UN-ESCAP), Bangkok, Thailand, has declared EDI as a ‘Center of Excellence’.