The Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh said that Mizoram Citrus Fruit "Centre of Excellence" (CoE), located at Lunglei, is availing Israeli technology and has emerged as a unique of its kind institution in India which, though located in Mizoram, caters to the entire North-Eastern region and indeed, to the entire country. The issue came up during a discussion on various Mizoram State related projects when the Minister for Law & Judicial, Parliamentary Affairs, Transport, Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Shri T.J. Lalnuntluanga called on the DoNER Minister today. Dr Jitendra Singh expressed satisfaction that the "Centre of Excellence" for Citrus Fruit, which became functional last year, has started providing planting material and training to farmers with collaboration from Israel and some of the officers of Mizoram have already received their training from Israel.
He said that it was an initiative of the Government led by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi that followed a tripartite collaboration of the Government of Israel, State Government of Mizoram and the Union Government, with the Ministry of DoNER performing the role of facilitator and coordinator. The technical support, planting material and capacity building is being provided by Israel and the Centre specializes in exclusively dealing with the processing of Citrus Fruits, he added. Shri Lalnuntluanga also submitted to Dr Jitendra Singh a proposal for community based eco-tourism project envisaged to be set up at Tlangsam, Champhai in Sikkim at an estimated cost of Rs. 15 crore. The proposal stated that Mizoram, being part of the Himalayan region, has huge potentials which could be utilized for bringing up such projects and would also benefit the local community. The Mizoram Minister also handed over to the DoNER Minister a copy of the project proposals submitted by the State Government to the Ministry of DoNER. These include construction of Serlui Bailey Bridge, reinstallation of Artificial Football Turf at Aizawl, development of District Hospital at Mamit, Project for control and mitigation of landslides in the State, construction and restoration of minor irrigation projects, etc.