Cold-chain infrastructure pieces comprise a physical bridge that enables the farm-to-fork flow of food. How does one correctly evaluate the infrastructure capacity needs of a cold-chain?
Only with access to relevant information and only with clear understanding of what comprises the total cold-chain. Unfortunately, such assessments in the past have related to one sole component, the cold store. The most commonly quoted capacity gap was assessed in 2010, where that report stated that the country (India) needed creating another 37 million metric tons in storage capacity.
That 2010 analysis assumed that all infrastructure created, continued to be operational, irrespective of technology or ageing. The assessment did not resort to first hand data on the existing usable and available capacity in the country. As a mere desk review of statistics, with the existing capacity not ascertained, the gap mentioned served purpose at a very basic level only.
