In Despair’s Wake: When Dairy Dreams Die Under Bank Pressure
I’ve just learned of a heart breaking suicide by a dairy entrepreneur in Madurai—not the first, but perhaps the most urgent yet. Today, I call upon the entire dairy fraternity to confront a vital question: in the eyes of the system, what truly is the value of a dairy farmer’s or entrepreneur’s life? These individuals […]
Cows, Climate Resilience, and the Human Dilemma
Over the last three days, I have had the privilege of participating in thought-provoking workshops on rural development and climate-resilient dairying. Amidst all the innovative discussions, one stark truth emerged: the problem does not lie in designing policies or ensuring that benefits trickle down to the people. The real challenge is in defining the true […]
Future Milk Availability: 4 Critical Challenges Facing the Global and Indian Dairy Industry
Recently, I came across an insightful infographic by A Insights highlighting four pivotal challenges facing the global dairy industry. Intrigued, I delved deeper to understand the impact of these challenges on our ambitious forecast of around 660 billion liters of milk production and 800 ml of per capita availability by 2047, coinciding with India’s centenary […]
Budget 2024-25 Missing Dairy Focus again
The much-awaited budget for FY 25 by Modi 3.0 has been presented. As a dairy farmer, I searched the Finance Minister’s speech for words such as cow, livestock, dairy, milk, animal husbandry, methane, manure, FMD, Brucellosis, and biogas. Unfortunately, none of these terms were mentioned even once. I then looked for other key terms and […]
Accountability in Food Safety Starts at the Top – Fingertip in ice cream
Dear top management of Food establishments , if a finger is found in a food product, the responsibility doesn’t fall on your team—it falls squarely on you.” In a shocking incident in India, a consumer recently discovered a fingertip in a packaged ice cream, raising grave concerns about food safety standards and practices in the […]
Creating a Risk Register for the Dairy Industry Amidst the Meta Crisis
Globally , Ist Jun is celebrated as World Milk day. Dairy is a globally essential food source, consumed by over 80% of the world’s population. It provides vital nutrients for people of all ages, supports millions of livelihoods through dairy farming, and contributes significantly to national economies in many countries. Happy World Milk Day to […]
Empowering Artisans: Imperative of GI Tagging for Boosting Indian Dairy Exports
Dairy Development in India Since the inception of Operation Flood in the early 1970s, India has exhibited remarkable growth in milk production and per capita milk availability. Data reveals that milk production triples and per capita availability doubles approximately every 25 years. Following this trend, India is projected to produce over 600 million MT of […]
From Food inflation to Food inclusion-Devinder Sharma
In Norway, dairy farmers receive just 21.9 per cent of the prevailing supermarket price of milk. Against 25.50 Kroner that consumers shell out for milk in supermarkets, dairy farmers get only 5.62 Kroners. In fact, the chart below presents a very clear picture of what ails agriculture across the globe. Farmers share in the end […]
Bharat Pashudhan App as conceived a decade back in our Vision 2030
When I heard about the launch of Bharat Pashudhan App by our Prime Minister Modi ji, I was elated . The roots of this joy stemmed from my recommendation of the 5-I model, which I included in our Dairy Industry Vision 2030 document launched on February 20th, 2014. The vision document could be downloaded from […]
My smiles are as fake as your promises-Lakhpati Didi
Today, on February 1, 2024, our country’s budget has been announced. Given that 2024 is an election year, an interim budget has been presented, subject to review by the elected government in the latter half of the year. Recently, I came across news indicating that by December 2023, India might have only utilized 45% of […]