New Delhi, Feb 5 (IANS): Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has joined hands with Zomato for home delivery of street food in six cities. As a part of Prime Minister Street Vendor's AtmaNibhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme, the MoHUA entered into MoU with Zomato, to bring street food vendors on its food-tech platform.

In a statement MoHUA said that initially MoHUA and Zomato will run a pilot program by on-boarding 300 vendors across six cities namely - Bhopal, Ludhiana, Nagpur, Patna, Raipur, Vadodara.

"The street vendors will be helped with PAN and fssai registration, training on technology/ partner app usage, menu digitization and pricing, hygiene and packaging best practices. Upon the successful completion of the pilot, MoHUA and Zomato plan to expand this initiative across the country in phases," it said.

As per the MoHUA, this will give street food vendors online access to thousands of consumers and help these vendors grow their businesses.

The MoHUA also launched the Mobile Application for PMSVANidhi se Samriddhi- Socio-economic profiling of PM SVANidhi beneficiaries and their families to link them to various Central government Schemes.

"Covid-19 pandemic has restricted consumers from stepping out and forced them to follow physical distancing norms. In the given scenario it is important to connect Street Food Vendors with technology-enabled platforms to help them grow their business, thus helping them gain financially," said the ministry.

In a first of its kind initiative, MoHUA entered into an MoU with Swiggy on October 5 last year and it is now joining hands with Zomato to empower street food vendors with digital technology.

The MoHUA has coordinated with the key stakeholders including Municipal Corporations, fssai, Zomato and GST officials to ensure that street food vendors are facilitated in completing the necessary prerequisites for this initiative.