Inaugurated on September 24 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India Food Park is spread across 110 acres at Tumkur in Karnataka. Work on the food processing facility began four years ago. It is among the first of the 24-odd facilities that the Ministry of Food Processing Industries (MoFPI) has planned to launch in India in the coming years. “Four such facilities will become operational in a year’s time and we are already working on 17 more to be finalised in the coming years,” said Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Union Minister for Food Processing, at the inauguration. The India Food Park facility is being developed on a public-private-partnership basis wherein the Karnataka state government has invested Rs.50 crore in the form of the land parcel and the balance Rs.200 crore has been pumped in by Kishore Biyani’s Future Consumer Enterprise Ltd. It has a state-of-the-art cold chain infrastructure, pulping and IQF lines, spiral freezers, mechanized sorting facilities, packaging and quality testing centres, rice, spice flour mills, grain silos, warehouses and R&D centres. “An additional Rs.750 crore will be invested in the facility in the coming years and we are hoping that this unit will be completely operational in another two to three years’ time,” said Biyani, adding that the group is targeting revenues upwards of Rs.20,000 crore from the food processing business. He also said that two more facilities are being planned in West Bengal (Kharagpur, 65 acre) and Madhya Pradesh. The two units will cater to food processing activities in the east and north India regions. Once completed, India Food Park will have around 50 units for food processing and dedicated plants to manufacture Indian savouries and snacks, frozen food products, chutneys, pasta, dry fruits and nuts, chocolates, and much more. The facility will employ close to 10,000 people eventually and positively impact the livelihoods of farmers, producers and agrientrepreneurs in Tumkur and beyond.