President Droupadi Murmu on Monday suggested that women should be provided easy loans and market access to set up ventures in dairy sector as this segment plays a special role in making them self-reliant and changing their social and economic status.

Addressing the convocation of Karnal-based National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI), Murmu said women have over 70 per cent participation in the dairy sector and play an important role in the dairy industry in India.

“There is a need to ensure that the women in dairy sector have equal rights and opportunities to take leadership role with decision making power for which more opportunities in education, training and skill development may be required,” Murmu said.

Highlighting that more than one-third of the students who received their degrees are girls and 50 per cent of those who received gold medals are also girls, she said “I want some of you to become job creators and entrepreneurs in the dairy industry.” She urged the students to always try to learn new things and work for the welfare of the people.

As many as 544 students received their degrees at the convocation, attended by Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar and Indian Council of Agricultural Research’s (ICAR) director general Himanshu Pathak.

Institutions like NDRI have an important role to play in the inclusive development of the country, she said adding the Karnal-based institute has developed technology to produce clones of high milk yielding buffaloes and cows, helping the country to raise milk production capacity of animals and enhance farmers’ income.

Increasing demand

Due to the increasing population of the country, demand for milk products is increasing, even though India is the largest producer of milk in the world, having a share of 22 per cent in global milk output. Dairy sector contributes 5 per cent to the country’s GDP and provides livelihood to about 8 crore families in India.

“The dairy sector is facing challenges like the availability of good quality fodder, change in weather due to climate change and livestock diseases. Making milk production and dairy farming sustainable is a challenge before us,” she said. It is the responsibility of all to develop the dairy industry by adopting environment-friendly and climate-smart technologies, keeping animal welfare in mind, she added.

As NDRI has been promoting various technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from dairy farms and focusing on clean energy sources like biogas production, the President congratulated the scientists for their relentless efforts. “The farmers of Punjab and Haryana played a special role in the success of the green revolution as well as the white revolution. I salute all the farmers,” she said. Murmu said the dairy industry also plays an important role in ensuring the food and nutritional security of India.

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