India is the largest producer of liquid milk, but there is a demand-supply mismatch as production has slowed down in the last two years, the Union Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, has said.
Inaugurating the Mumbai office of Dwarka Milk, a private sector milk procuring and processing company on Monday, Mr Mukherjee said that over the last decade, global milk production has gone up by 2.1 per cent to about 710 million tonnes in 2010. The year-on-year increase has been in the range of 0.9 per cent to 2.9 per cent. However, there has been a decrease in the growth rate since 2006.
In the last two years, the production in India increased by 3 to 4.5 million tonnes a year, against the steady increase of 6 million tonnes a year in the earlier years.
“If we can bridge this gap, perhaps we can meet the gap as it exists today. But we shall have to go increasing the production because the demand will increase with the growth in population and incomes,” he said. “There is no other alternative but to produce, preserve, process and distribute.”
The Finance Minister also inaugurated a cattle finance scheme for marginal dairy farmers by Dwarka Milk. Under the scheme, Dwarka Milk will arrange for farmers for buying milch cattle by standing guarantee.
Farmers can also buy cattle feed from the company on easy credit. The company will also provide insurance for the cattle for which the premium will be adjusted against the farmers' coupons, said Mr Kapil Rajput, Managing Director, Dwarka Milk.
Going ahead, the company plans to diversify into production of other milk products such as cheese, butter etc.