Atharva Manohar Desai

• The Government of Maharashtra (GoM) through Government of India (GoI) has received a loan from the International Development Association (IDA) for implementation of Maharashtra Agricultural Competitiveness Project (MACP).
• The Project Development objective of the MACP is to increase the productivity, profitability and market access of the farming community in Maharashtra. This would be achieved by providing farmers with technical knowledge, market intelligence and market networks to support diversification and intensification of agriculture production aimed at responding to market demand. Farmers will also be assisted in establishing farmer organizations, developing alternative market channels outside of the regulated markets and in supporting the modernization of promising traditional wholesale markets. The project has three components viz., (i) Intensification and diversification of market led production; (ii) Improving Farmer access to Markets by Promoting alternative Markets and Modernizing existing APMC, and (iii) project coordination and management.
• Intensification and diversification of market led production: By providing market led agriculture technology transfer to improve productivity and quality production and market information and marketing intelligence, agribusiness opportunities through agribusiness promotion facility and livestock improvement through livestock support services.
• Improving Farmer access to Markets by Promoting alternative Markets and Modernizing existing APMC: By promoting alternative marketing systems involving farmers in the formation of producer groups, their associations, developing Farmers Common Service Centre (FCSC), introducing E-Marketing platform with the help of commodity exchanges, by producing warehouse receipt financing to overcome price risk and to provide moderate improvement in Rural Haats. Besides modernization of selected APMCs and Livestock Markets.
• Project management: Would help to ensure effective project management at the state and district levels, and support information and logistics, communications, project related consultancies and monitoring and evaluation.

• The implementation of MACP involves the participation of the department's viz. Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, and Agricultural Marketing. For policy decisions and advice HPC under the chairmanship of Chief Minister of the State has been constituted. Likewise, the Steering Committee headed by the Chief Secretary has also been established. The Principal Secretary (Coop. & Mktg.) is the Nodal Officer for the Project. PCU headed by the Project Director and PIUs under the heads of the departments involved in the Project have been created for coordination and implementation of the Project.
• During the implementation of the Project various activities will be conducted by the concerned Line Departments. These activities involve procurement in the areas viz. works, goods / equipment, and consultancy services.
• All procurements under the MACP to be carried out by PCU, various PIUs and beneficiary institutions, would be done as per the World Bank’s procurement procedure.
• Procurement of all goods, works and services will be carried out in accordance with the World Bank’s "Guidelines: Procurement Under IBRD Loans and IDA Credits" dated May 2004, revised October, 2006 (Procurement Guidelines); and "Guidelines: Selection and Employment of Consultants by World Bank Borrowers" dated May 2004, revised October, 2006 (Consultancy Guidelines) and the agreed procedures described in the Legal Agreements. In case of a discrepancy between the contents of this manual and the provisions of the above Guidelines, the provisions in the Guidelines will prevail.
• A Procurement Manual for the project has been prepared stating in detail the procedures to be followed during the procurement of goods, works and services along with the thresholds for each category. The Procurement Manual has been prepared, and will be given to all the PIUs and beneficiary institutions and all stakeholders in order to guide them on issues of procurement. The Procurement Manual will be translated in Marathi and the Marathi version of Procurement Manual will be given to all the line departments and all stakeholders.

The proposed MIS will have the following modules for tracking various MACP activities and generating Reports:

• Grievance Redressal Management Module (GAAP)
• Knowledge Management Module (KMM)
• Financial Management Module (FMM)
• Procurement Management Module (PMM)
• Monitoring and Evaluation Module (M&EM)

The proposed MIS once implemented, will be used by personnel of various agencies engaged in the implementation of MACP for capturing relevant data to be used for the purpose of monitoring of various project activities to be undertaken at various field locations by a number of implementing agencies. The MIS is being developed as one of the activities under Component A (defined in the section below) as per the Project Implementation Plan of MACP.

• The Implementing Departments / Implementing Agencies will regularly monitor and report on the Project’s physical and financial inputs and outputs.
• The M&E consultant will concurrently monitor and evaluate Project processes, approaches, institutions and quantify short term outputs and outcomes. The M&E agency will also carry out the baseline survey and the evaluations of the Project’s outcomes and impacts at mid-term and prior to Project completion.