Actionable strategies for MAPs Sector

Dr Arun Chandan

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1. Formulation Development & Traditional Wisdom

• All herbal formulations must be developed under expert supervision involving Ayurveda Vaidyas to ensure traditional alignment, safety, and efficacy.
• Classical texts like Charaka Samhita, Sushruta, Bhavaprakash, and Vedas should be referenced to validate formulations.
• Only natural, organic, and bio-compatible bases should be used in herbal value-added products—no chemical-laden materials.

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2. Quality Planting Material & Nursery Development

• Use only certified planting material sourced from SMPBs, ICAR/Ayush-certified nurseries, or approved institutions.
• Promote decentralized community nurseries and model herbal gardens in rural areas for localized propagation and awareness.

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3. Collective Farming through FPOs

• Encourage Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) instead of individual farmers for better scale, sustainability, and market access.
• FPOs should be empowered to manage cultivation, aggregation, processing, branding, and marketing.

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4. Certification & Quality Standards

• Provide technical and financial assistance for GAP (Good Agricultural Practices) and GFCP (Good Field Collection Practices) certifications.
• NMPB and State Boards should facilitate certification drives.

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5. Sustainable Collection & Community Involvement

• Enable Forest-Farmer Partnerships via Joint Forest Management (JFM) schemes for sustainable wild collection.
• Ensure community involvement with training on conservation, sustainable harvesting, and primary value addition.

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6. Infrastructure Development

• Establish Modern Collection Centres (MCCs) at block/cluster level with facilities for drying, grading, primary processing, and quality testing.
• Create storage godowns and drying units in high-potential regions.

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7. Digital Ecosystem: Marketing & Traceability

• Operationalize the ‘Jadi Buti Bazar’ online portal to connect farmers, traders, exporters, and industries. Include price discovery, digital quality certificates, and blockchain-based traceability.
• Develop ‘e-Vaidya’ App for AYUSH doctors and traditional healers to enable trading of small-volume herbs digitally.

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8. Market Reforms: MSP & Herbal Mandis

• Formulate a Minimum Support Price (MSP) mechanism for prioritized medicinal plants to prevent distress sales.
• Set up regional herbal mandis with physical and digital auction facilities to boost transparent trade.

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9. Legal Framework & Biodiversity Compliance

• Enforce the Biological Diversity Act, 2002 strictly, ensuring all buyers and pharmaceutical firms procure raw materials only from certified and biodiversity-cleared sources.
• Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) must play an active role in resource ownership and benefit sharing.

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10. Backward & Forward Linkages

• Appoint Sub-Divisional Medical Officers (SDMOs) or Ayurvedic Medical Officers as nodal facilitators to oversee local cultivation, usage in government health facilities, and integration into public procurement.

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11. Micro-Enterprise Promotion

• Promote establishment of small-scale herbal processing units by farmers, SHGs, or cooperatives linked to collection centres for local value addition and rural job creation.

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12. MGNREGA & GeM Integration

• Align MGNREGA works with herbal cultivation, nursery development, and infrastructure creation.
• Register MGNREGA herbal vendors on Government e-Marketplace (GeM) to formalize participation in herbal value chains.