Embassy Archives What's New/Press Releases

Visit of Mr. Subodh Kant Sahai, Minister of State for food processing industries to US

Washington, DC
June 4, 2007 

Mr. Subodh Kant Sahai, Minister of State for food processing industries is on a visit to US. He met with the US Secretary for Agriculture Mr. Mike Johanns at Washington DC today in the forenoon. Both the leaders discussed about the post-harvest and food processing initiatives in India and the India-US Knowledge Initiative(AKI) in Agriculture. Mr. Sahai said that India is the largest producer of Milk and second largest producer of fruits and vegetables. However, the food processing industry in India is at a nascent stage. Perishable food items in India have improper shelf life and poor marketing facilities. The Honorable Minister said that the focus need to be on four areas of reducing post-harvest losses, building supply chain, cold chain, and developing the processing industry. India-US Knowledge Initiative in agriculture could play an important role in all these areas. He further mentioned about the need for setting up a Joint Laboratory either in India or in the US that could work on quality testing and standardization for setting mutually suitable quality and standard to facilitate trade in agricultural items. The Minister said that India would be interested in expanding trade and investment in these areas and would welcome technology transfer from US to India in the Food Processing sector. 

Prior to visiting Washington DC, Mr. Sahai visited New York where he had a meeting with the Corporate representatives organized by the US India Business Council. Representatives from companies like Pepsi, Hershey, Cargill, JP Morgan participated in this meeting. 

The Honorable Minister will have meetings at the Chicago Board of Trade at Chicago and will have more business Roundtables at San Francisco and Los Angeles.