Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal has said that the PM GatiShakti must be effectively leveraged using the area development approach to extend benefits to the nation beyond the infrastructure sector.

Piyush Goyal was chairing a meeting to review the progress of PM GatiShakti with the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) and eight concerned ministries in New Delhi on Wednesday evening.

The minister impressed upon the participating ministries/departments to harness the full potential of the integrated platform to further accelerate India’s infrastructure and economic growth.

Goyal said that the agriculture sector can be supported by setting up common facilities on agricultural lands by cooperatives and start-ups using the integrated framework of PM GatiShakti and data from the National Master Plan (NMP). The minister highlighted that the area development approach under PM GatiShakti can be used for engaging with aspirational districts of NITI Aayog.

DPIIT Special Secretary Sumita Dawra presented the progress of PM GatiShakti in terms of improving the data quality of the NMP, standardising data layers and establishing Quality Improvement Plan (QIP) mechanism for better planning.

To encourage the usage of NMP for social sector planning, five new ministries are proposed to be on-boarded by PM GatiShakti, in addition to fourteen social sector departments/ministries already on board, to augment the socio-economic development in the country.

In addition to improving the domestic logistics ecosystem, the DPIIT is progressively working towards improving the EXIM logistics. An EXIM Logistics Group has been formed with other concerned departments/ministries. An action plan for improving the country’s performance on each of the Logistics Performance Index (LPI) parameters of the World Bank report will be formulated and executed soon. Efforts are also being made to ensure end-to-end multi-modal tracking of cargo by integrating the Unified Logistics Interface Platform (ULIP) with GSTN data. In order to impart wider understanding and adoption, capacity building of officials at States level is also planned through training modules on PM GatiShakti at Central Training Institutes.