Excess milk production in Andhra Pradesh

News and Views
1

Usually there are problems with shortages. But in the case of A.P. Dairy Development Cooperative Federation (APDDCF) the opposite is true. It is faced with the unique problem of glut of milk so much so that it doesn’t know where to store all the milk that is coming its way.

Everyday the Federation is left with an extra 1.70 lakh litres to handle which it simply can’t. Therefore, it is toying with the idea of declaring a ‘milk holiday’ once in a fortnight.

The idea is not to procure milk two days in a month so as to take care of storage problem and also the rising cost of procurement. The proposal will be placed before the APDDCF board to get its nod. The last time the Federation declared a milk holiday was in 1993.

The APDDCF has been flooded with surplus milk from September onwards. The per day procurement shot up from 3.90 lakh litres in August to 4.69 lakh litres in September. It touched 5.27 lakh litres in October and 5.93 lakh litres in November. In December, milk procurement is projected to be 6.29 lakh litres.

Faced with this unusual phenomenon, the Federation has started converting the excess milk into skimmed milk powder (SMP).

“We are doing all this only to not inconvenience farmers,” says Mohammed Ali Rafath, managing director and vice chairman, APDDCF.

Unlike private diaries, the APDDCF is procuring milk beyond its requirement to help the farmers. Its factory has a capacity to handle only 4 lakh litres a day, including 30,000 litres of by-products such as flavoured milk, butter, khova, lassi.

In the last few months it has been getting an extra 1.70 lakh litres milk per day. Of this, 1.02 lakh litres is buffalo milk and the rest cow. To procure this excess milk, it has to shell out Rs.41 lakh per day.

To tide over the problem, the APDDCF has started converting the milk into powder and now it has a stock of 1,000 metric tonnes of butter and 800 metric tonnes of skimmed milk powder. To clear this stockpile, the Federation has asked the Women Development and Child Welfare Department to use its powder milk in its programme of supplying cooked food to pregnant and lactating mothers.

“This way we hope to supply 100 tonnes of skimmed milk powder per month”, says Mr. Rafath.

The excess milk production is the result of milch animal induction programme wherein the government provides 25 per cent subsidy on purchase of cattle and also reimburses transport charges.

Another factor is the vigorous artificial insemination programme taken up by the Animal Husbandry Department.

Why can’t the APDDCF push up its sales? It cannot because there are no takers for its Vijay brand of milk. While Hyderabad has a liquid milk market of 12 lakh litres a day, APDDCF accounts for just 3.60 lakh litres a day.

Now the APDDCF is planning to develop forward linkages by strengthening its district market where the sales are very dismal.

Source : Hindu
thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp … 117796.ece

2

Is this the problem only with APDDCF or with other private dairies also.
Siva Sankara Reddy.

3

yes, even the private dairies are refusing to take milk on one or other pretext like percentage of fat and SNF. the case of the dairy farmers who own only cows is pathetic, as the private dairies do not want cow milk at all for commercial reasons. the production cost of cow milk in A.P is working out to be at RS 23.00/ltr at the same time the average price a farmer commands is at Rs 17.00/ltr. earlier the average price a farmer used to command was around RS 19.00/ltr due to the excess production of milk all the dairies have slashed their buying price by RS 2.50/ltr. due to all these factors the viability of a dairy farm looks to be very bleak in future too … for enterprenuers the only advice that can be given is wait and watch the conditions for period of time before investing in it.

Prathap.

4

added to that, there was an article stating to get milk from other states to supply govt school children.

regards
rajesh

5

Hi friends,

The situation is not different in karnataka too…KMF is silently reduced successively Rs .3 in last 3 months silently, no news, anouncements in media. Infact, the same Rs.4 was increased successively two times by showing the dairy farmers( Govt., quoted at that time the same 3/4th of increase will be passed to farmers).

The other pains add to these are…all feeds ,fodder,labour,transportation,services or overheads are shoot up by two times nearly. It is very difficult to understand the logics of all these…apart from the regular routine problems/hurdles of dairy farm.

yes, the enthuiastic dairy farmers can wait and watch. But, already invested and struggling peoples…to bear…the heat…without any excuses or close down the same to avoid fruther lossess.

kasturiraju.

6

Hi Kasturiraju,

Looks like farmers are being paid Rs. 16 now!! As you said there was no news abt this in the media and nothing is being done to fix it. Any hopes of getting this back to Rs. 20 levels? I haven’t seen any organization protesting against this reduction.

-Biju

7

S above 2lakh dairy farmers in karnataka & above 3 lakh dairy farmers in Andra but no one will not their mouth, no 1 protesting this, very pain full to hear

8

Hi friends,

The problem is… All of we never seen any type of news like… The water bottles,cocola,maaza prices hike in media’s headings or as news,protest from common man to all type of peoples.

Also, think how the prices of these products are fixed…distributed. More than that, how it will be produced…!!! no masstitis,hoof problems,labour problems,power problems,subsidy will be given on total investments,land ,clearences,loans and services will be provided/supported by the govt., in single window schemes.

See the dairy farmers fate, you have to struggle pledge your property to get loans, struggle hard against un-foreseen as well as the situation which are totally not in our controle…like animal health,nature threats like diseases/infections (again the cost of medication parity/viable need not explain further here),famine or drought situation,worst labour availability and power cuts problems (we can’t invest on alternate power solutions because of no parity/viability and still the peoples talk… for dairy farm hut and backyard waste is enough and should do in that way), feeds prices (which is not at all possible to controle from our end any time.

With all these difficulties we have to work hard with 100 % committment,involvement,struggles,knowledge to produce milk …whic is very nutritious…very essential to each and every human kind as well as animals…for that you can’t fix the price…or no one bother to understand the same. where is the value for all efforts and how can you ask the youngsters,educateds to invite to this uncertainity enterpreunership…?

Friends you know, just the coke or water packing materials supplier has to invest 400 - 500 crores to supply the bottles or different packaging to his client and he is very much making profit out of it. Every day he will be throwing nearly 50-60 MTS plastic waste on this earth. Like this in our nation around 70-80 peoples/industries are their as on date.

Imagine, who is given importance and making name,profits and surviving. Then where is the policies for all these things…who has to do or bother…it will be solved with any one’s cry…the fact is even to-day dairy farmers/any livestock farmers dont have… realistic/practical genuine simple machines/solutions for our farm activities.

may be no end to write…sorry.

kasturiraju.

9

we can not keep blaming the policy or policymakers, it,s we who gave them the power todo so. as far as thesubject of dairy farming is concerned, it is very much un organised and difficult to bring all the people involved under one roof.where as in the case of punjab an entity called PROGRESSIVE DAIRY FARMERS ASSOCIATION is formed decades back. so far the organisation has concentrated on development of productivity and breed upgradation by importing semen.now at this stage what i have heard is they have acheived blood purity levels of upto 90% in hf cows. even punjab is facing the same kind of crisis today, but under the banner of the association they have threatened to stop supplying milk for 01 week to any entity… following that,the C M of punjab has called the president of the association for talks… would you expect the same to happen here? if so how many years/decades… till that time things will continue to be like this only. however alocal chapter of P D F A ap has been formed in jan this year and they have presented the case of dairy farmers to the hnrble C M … so far nothing has happened . we shall wait and see for such time tocome… thanks -prathap.

10

Surge in milk production propels dairies to plan capacity addition
Article from ET

economictimes.indiatimes.com/mar … 498665.cms