The central government plans to come out with a national livestock policy to improve the quality and quantity of livestock and livestock products in the country, according to Rajni Sekhri Sibal, joint secretary, department of animal husbandry, dairying and fisheries.
Delivering the keynote address at the South Asian Dairy Congress in the city on Sunday, Sibal said the proposed national livestock policy aims to bring in qualitative and quantitative improvement in livestock and livestock products. “India is a leading producer of milk in the world. Milk contributes 5% of the country’s gross domestic product. We need to focus on how to improve quality and quantity of livestock products,’’ she said.
Sibal said the livestock sector has been battered by a huge percentage of unproductive population with low milk yield. “There has been no increase in the acreage of fodder cultivation in the country. If no efforts are made to take up fodder cultivation on a large scale, the livestock sector will face serious problems. Animal health has also not received the attention it deserved and there are only 27,000 veterinary hospitals in the country against the requirement of 67,000,’’ she said.
According to her, only 15% of the milk produced gets processed in the organised sector. Emphasising the need for public-private partnership in the dairy sector, she said the agencies concerned are not able to procure milk from small farmers who own one or two cattle. She said the department of animal husbandry plans to meet Union finance minister P Chidambaram shortly. “I want banks and other financial institutions to treat dairy and livestock segments on par with the agriculture sector while sanctioning loans,’’ she said.
AK Srivastava, director, National Dairy Research Institute, said many cooperative societies’ performance in procuring milk is not up to the mark. “Milk cooperative societies contribute only 7-8% of the milk procured in the country. We are not spending enough on dairy development — we spend only $17 against Japan’s $120 to produce 100 litres of milk,’’ Srivastava said.
Stating that efforts must be made to reach the target of producing 191 million tonnes of milk a year by 2020, he said milk production was only 17.1 million tonnes when white revolution began and now it is about 121.7 million tonnes. “I am requesting the central government not to enter Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) with countries that have surplus milk. Having FTAs with such countries will not help our farmers,’’ he said.
