Visakhapatnam: Andhra Pradesh government should establish a multi-purpose cold storage facility for handling perishable cargo products at the international air cargo complex inaugurated a couple of months back, said industry experts. According to them, the Government of Karnataka had set up perishable cargo handling centre at Bengaluru airport last year at a cost of Rs 48 crore. Similarly, the Andhra Pradesh government must open a cold storage for pharmacy and other sectors. The cargo complex spreads over 674.64 sq metre and has a small cold room facility which is being used for storing fish and prawns. It needs a multi-purpose cold storage infrastructure with capability to handle several perishable products such as pharmaceuticals, seafood, meat, flowers, fruits and vegetables.
“The pharma sector depends on cold storage facility to store products which have to be stored separately. Pharma stocks should be preserved separately until dispatch. International air cargo complex may not support pharma companies without a cold storage,” AP Chambers of Commerce and Industry Federation Safety Committee chairman B. Madhu said. As per India Society of Heating Refrigerating and Air conditioning Engineers (ISHRAE), every city must have a multi-purpose cold storage facility to cater to the local production.
There are around 100 single-commodity cold storages in the state. Most of them are concentrated in Guntur for the preservation of red chillies. Arvind Surange, former president of ISHRAE said, “The state government should modernise the outdated cold storages with the latest energy-efficient refrigeration infrastructure. Out of 4,000 outdated cold storages across the country, 6 per cent are in south India.”
When compared to the North, there are lesser number of cold storages in the South except few major cities like Bengaluru and Hyderabad. A multi-purpose cold storage facility is coming up in Chennai. There is huge opportunity for cold stores as the country has 1,000 pack houses while 65,000 houses are required,” he informed.
