Laying a strong and
stable dairy farming foundation will be crucial to meet the mounting
demands of milk and capitalize on the growth potential. It is
important to address some major challenges faced by the dairy
industry like low animal output, poor farm management, lack of
veterinary care and animal health assistance, improper feed
management, insufficient finance and others to list a few. The Indian
Dairy industry comprises of small scale dairy farmers, medium scale
and large farm owners who work in collaboration with private sector
dairies and cooperatives which provide excellent support to these
farmers. Besides the existing policies, the government needs to
devise plans and strategies for the sustainable development of both
the farmers and dairy industry by providing them required access to
resources and benefits of these schemes.
Earlier, the private
players have made several efforts to establish large scale dairy
farms to achieve high productivity from low operating costs, improved
product quality and increased profits. However, owing to the limited
access to resources, government policies, high operating costs, lack
of proper knowledge and large funding has led to minimal success in
their initiatives. The prevailing diversity in the farming systems,
existing infrastructure, topographies, climatic conditions, farmers’
capabilities, and sociocultural facts will determine the scope of
commercial dairy farming in the country in the approaching years. A
few innovative farming models surfacing in dairy
farming are mentioned below.
Large Scale Integrated
Dairy Farms
The large scale dairy
farms comprise of crossbred cows and a private set-up constituting
milk processing machines, feeding system and storage facilities. The
ownership, responsibilities and maintenance are held by the private
player. They may also establish a mutual contract with the farmers to
regularize the supply of fodder which is important for cattle to
produce good milk. The milk is either used to produce derivatives and
other products at its own plant or sold to other dairies. This model
is beneficent to scale up the dairy farm operations, trace end to end
production, and control processes.
Progressive Dairy
Farms
There will be mid-size
dairy farms with 300-500 cattle animals coming up in future as they
possess an edge in business with effective labor management, fodder
and veterinary services. The owner without investing much money can
achieve consistent supply of good quality milk and provide all
financial and technical support to the farms. The government hosts
various breeding programs and lends support to marginal farmers for
purchase of cattle. Due to limited capital investment by progressive
farmers and lack of a comprehensive system to ensure regular checks
on farm operation by the owner pose challenges for this model. But if
farmers and processors get into a mutual partnership, the model can
certainly provide benefits to all the stakeholders.
Community Dairy Farms
The model is based on
community dairy farm setup in China where milch animals from the
neighborhood are raised and taken care of. The private player largely
invests in the farm infrastructure while the ownership of the farm
lies with individual milk producers who are responsible to manage
cows and their shelter with the assistance of private player. This
lets the small scale farmers gain benefits of technology and
resources.
Industry Supported
Farming Model
Many private players
provide financial support and technical guidance to the farmers
through tie-ups to expand their cattle size and scale up dairy farm
operations like feed management, building proper infrastructure and
implementing modern breeding practices.
No comments