Dairies in Saurashtra and Kutch Region march ahead, procuring one million litres of milk per day

ANAND - The Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (Amul), the apex body of 13 Milk Unions of Gujarat having a membership of around 2.8 million farmer members have reached another milestone in the history of dairy industry of our country by creating over 1600 Village Dairy Cooperatives in Saurashtra and Kutch regions within a short span of two years.

These dairy cooperatives are now collecting an unprecedented quantity of over one million litres of milk everyday. As a result of this initiative of GCMMF, milk producers in Saurshtra and Kutch particularly in these 1600 villages now receive milk prices in the range of Rs. 310 per kg fat to as high as Rs. 360 per kg fat. These remunerative prices are the highest they ever received in the past and are equal to other developed milksheds of Gujarat.

New District Unions have come up in Rajkot, Surendranagar, Bhavnagar, Amreli, and Junagadh. Recently, the milk producers of Kutch have started their own milk union to overcome the economic exploitation by the private companies and milk procurement agents in the semi-arid region and largest district of Gujarat. Daily milk procurement of the new unions at Surendragar and Rajkot is approximately 3,25,000 litres each.

Bhavnagar union receives 1,35,000 litres per day. Unions at Amreli and Junagdh receive around 55,000 litres each on a daily basis. Even Kutch Union that started only three weeks ago on Dev Diwali has crossed 12,000 litres and hopes to collect 1,00,000 litres per day very soon.

All along an impression was given that Saurashtra and Kutch regions lack in dairy development. But Govt. of Gujarat registered District Coop Unions in Junagadh, Bhavnagar, Kutch, Amreli, etc only recently. With this, the farmers of Saurashtra region have proved they too are fully competent to run their cooperatives and collect a million litres of milk every day.

With the heritage of Gir cows and Jafrabadi and Banni buffalos, it is possible that in the very near future milk collection will surpass 30 lakh litres from Kutch and Saurashtra District Cooperatives organised on the world renowned Amul pattern. (ANI)