The Centre on Monday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) aimed at providing a digital platform and empowering all stakeholders including traditional fishermen, fish farmers producer organisations, entrepreneurs from fisheries sector to buy and sell their products through e-market place.
ONDC is a unique platform of e-marketing that plays a significant role in the fisheries sector by connecting fishermen, fish farmers, Fish Farmers Producers Organisations (FFPOs) , self-help groups and other fishermen cooperatives in a structured manner.
Union Minister of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying Parshottam Rupala also released a booklet “From Catch to Commerce, Increasing Market Access through Digital Transformation”.
The minister emphasised the need for automation in the value chain and fish processing units while interacting with fishermen and FFPOs during the MoU signing ceremony. He informed that this collaboration of the Department of Fisheries with ONDC will not only address these challenges but catalyse the unlocking of the potential of digital commerce in the field of the Indian fisheries sector.
He emphasised that collaboration would serve numerous benefits for fishery industries like reduced transaction costs, increased market reach, improved transparency, increased competition & competitiveness, innovation, and employment generation. Further, he expressed his happiness over providing a digital platform to the traditional fishermen, FFPOs and other stakeholders for buying and selling fish and fish products through e-market.