How to increase the income of livestock farmer in India?:A PRACTICAL APPROACH
Dr. Chetna P. Modi
Ph.D. Scholar, Department of Animal nutrition,
College of Veterinary Science and A.H., Kamdhenu University, Gandhinagar- 382 010.
Introduction:
India has been endowed with a rich diversity and population of livestock. Livestock sector contributes 4.11% GDP and 25.6% of total Agriculture GDP. It is estimated that about 21 crore peoples depend upon livestock for their livelihood in India (Vikaspedia, 2020). India stands first in the world for milk production since the year 1997 and per capita milk availability has been improved to 394 g/day from mere 132 g/day in 1952. It is a tremendous progress especially if we take into account the rise of almost four-fold rise in human population from 35 crores to 139 crores. After this achievement and as well as participation of farmers in nation building the income of farmer as individual and community has not increased much. There is uneven distribution of improved share of livestock industry in GDP. However, before going into the constraints as well as remedial measures for improving the income of livestock farmers, we should acquaint ourselves with brief history of animal husbandry in India from start.
Brief History of animal husbandry in India:
- Dairy industry:
Livestock husbandry was the integral part of livelihood in India since ancient India. Archeological findings suggests that Barley and wheat cultivation along with the rearing of cattle, sheep and goat in Mehrgarh as early by 8000-6000 BCE in Neolithic period. Cattle rearing is also noted in Indian granthas like Ramayana and Mahabharata, as an important and universal occupation as farming. The ‘bullocks were used for draft purposes and cows were tended for milk which served the purposes of drinking, offering oblations, preparing butter, ghee, cheese, etc. Importance of livestock rearing was continued in the medieval period which can be seen in the book Ain-i-Akbari written during Akbar’s period. It mentions that one major object of taxation apart from the cultivated fields was cattle (Randhwa, 1980). But, animal husbandry sector suffered a lot during colonial area from 1800 AD onwards, especially as pressure of using available land for production of cash crops like cotton has substantially reduced the available community grazing land in India. It leads to lowering of the herd size of dairy animals.
However, along with this some interesting changes like commercialization of dairy sector also takes place at the end of nineteenth century mainly due to two reasons - To fulfill the milk demand of British troops in India
- To fulfill the need of newly arising urban centers like Bombay
For this specific purpose, large scale farms were established by British authorities. First farm was opened at Allahabad. Also, notably the it leads to set up of Veterinary colleges like Bombay Veterinary college at Bombay in 1886 and Madras Veterinary College in 1903 as Doblin hall in Chennai. Further improvement till independence includes attempts of cross breeding especially in military farms for Indian cow as foreign cattle bulls with high milk potential were available but same was not possible for buffaloes. Artificial insemination centers were also developed by the states.
After independence Government of India has started the planned dairy development. But, the availability of milk was exactly same in the year 1982 (131) after thirty years from 1952 (132). It was mainly due to the problem of initial indecisiveness in the implementation of cross breeding programs. Till 1960 improvement in the local breed was attempted with selective breeding but with little success (Gupta, 1983). Thereafter, two basic initiatives given the impetus of improving the milk production in country, - Direct use of frozen semen form foreign was initiated. Even Indian non-government organizations like Bhartiya Agro Industries Foundation (BAIF) has started its activities of A.I. in Maharashtra at first and spreading it to neighboring states
- Milk procurement system was developed at Anand which shows the way to whole nation for rise of cooperative dairies.
This phase of slow but sturdy development in milk production was followed by operation flood, a mighty and well-organized efforts by Government of India for development of dairy sector. Operation Flood, a well-known smallholder dairy production initiative, laid the foundation for a dairy cooperative movement. The NDDB assumed responsibility for setting up cooperatives and provided technical support for planning, farmer extension services, engineering, dairy technology, veterinary services, and nutrition for fostering dairy development. It consisted of three phases,
Phase 1: Started in July 1970, it has carried the objective of setting up dairy cooperatives in 18 milk sheds in 10 states, and to connect them with four best metropolitan markets. The phase ended in 1981 and India had 13,000 village dairy cooperatives covering 15,000 farmers.
Phase 2: the second phase of the operation assisted Dairy development programmes in Karnataka, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. By the end of this phase in 1985, India had 136 milk sheds, village dairy cooperatives reached 34,500 with 36 lakh members.
Phase 3: The final phase of the programme, emphasized to improve the productivity and efficiency of the dairy sectors for long-term sustainability. By the time phase 3 ended in 1996, there were 73,300 dairy cooperatives and over 9.4 million farmer members. The white revolution ended India’s dependence on imported milk solids. This phase has ended in giving up the jons to almost 10 million farmers.
Due to organized marketing and production by masses India has become the highest milk producing country in World in 1997 and still maintains the lead over all the countries in world.
Egg and meat industry:
Total egg production in India was just 1.83 billion in the year 1950 -51. It has increased stedily upto the year 1999-2000. From the year 1999-2000 onwards the production of egg improved substantially and it reached to 69.73 billion in the year 2012-13. About 94% of total egg produced in India is contributed by chickens while remaining 6% is equally contributed by ducks and other poultry. Per capita availability of eggs in India has also increased from just 5 eggs per annum in 1950-51 to 58 eggs per annum in 2012-13 which is still far below the ICMR recommendation of 365 eggs/ annum. Meat Production Total meat production including poultry meat was 5.9 million tonnes in 2012-13. Nearly 45% of the production of meat is contributed by Poultry alone. Buffalo, Goat, Pig, Sheep and Cattle contribute 19, 16, 8, 7 and 5% of total meat production, respectively (Islam et al., 2016).
Basic role of livestock in economy of Indian farmer
It plays important role in the economy of Indian farmer. Beside direct products like milk, meat, eggs etc. it also helps in agricultural activities of farmer like draught animals, manure production, gobar gas production etc. - Regular Income: Cows and buffaloes provides regular income to the livestock farmers through sale of milk. Animals like sheep and goat requires less investment and serve as hedge against any emergency like marriages, treatment of sick persons, children education etc. Poultry farmers also gain money through sale of eggs and chicken.
- Employment: It gives employment to even less literate and unskilled persons. The landless and less land people depend upon livestock for utilizing their labour during lean agricultural season.
- Food: The livestock products such as milk, meat and eggs are an important source of animal protein to the members of the livestock owners.
- Social security: The animals offer social security to the owners in terms of their status in the society.
- Draft : Marginal and small farmers with lack of mechanization depend upon bullocks for ploughing, carting and transport of both inputs and outputs.
- Dung: In rural areas dung is used for several purposes which include fuel as dung cakes and organic fertilizer for farm.
Interventions to increase the income of Indian farmers
To increase the income basically involves two aspects like - Economic production of livestock products
- Post harvest technologies and Value addition of livestock products
- Economic production of livestock products:
Over the years, due to the hard work of animal scientists in ICAR system as well state university systems number of technological interventions has developed that could raise the productivity of different livestock species if adopted area-wise.
a. Genetics and Breeding technologies
Using the crossbreeding techniques, many breeds have been evolved in cattle, pig, sheep, and poultry. Selective breeding has improved the buffaloes in India. These breeds have better production efficiency as compared indigenous animals. The need of hour is adoption and further propagation of these breeds through planned A.I. programs specific to the area for improved productivity.
b. Nutritional interventions:
The genetic gains can not be fully get exploited if it is not get supported through balance feeding and nutrition. Newer concepts of animal nutrition like complete ration, ration balancing, bypass protein, bypass fat, phytoadditives, transition period feeding, prebiotics feeding in calf will not will lead to lesser mortalities in calf but it will also help in improving the productivity in dairy animals and poultry. Pasture land as well as community pastures also needs to get developed with controlled grazing programs. As we have already seen in history that lack of pasture lands has effectively reduced the herd size of Indian livestock farmers.
c. Disease Control Technologies:
Diseases not only cause the mortality but also in sub-acute case substantially reduce the production potential of livestock. In India many deadly diseases such as rinderpest, foot and mouth disease, hemorrhagic septicemia, and black quarter are major threats to profitable livestock production. Production of vaccine, supply chain as well its importance as preventive measures needs to explained to farmers. A loss of single animal due to any disease is a great loss for farmers so they need to be educated for timely vaccination and treatment of animals - Post-harvest technologies and value addition
In India, only about 20% of the total milk production is processed into value-added products. Although considerable efforts have gone into developing infrastructure for milk processing in the cooperative sector, only about 5% of the total milk output is processed into table butter, cheese, milk powder, and baby foods.
Value addition of products may include strategies like selling of organic milk, desi cattle milk as well as milk rich in healthy omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids, falvoured milk etc. There is a considerable demand for processed meat products, but it remains constricted due to inadequate processing facilities. Different meat products loke sausages, chicken nuggets etc. have high demand and necessary infrastructure need to be ramped up for this by government side or through PPP models.
Conclusion:
We have rich heritage of livestock from ancient times as well as population. We have achieved a lot through many government and non-government organizations by improving the share of livestock sector in Indian GDP. But time has come to look towards improving the income of livestock farmers and remedy is adoption of technologies for improving the efficiency of production and post-harvest technologies for fetching good prices to the farmers.
References:
1) Gupta P.R. (1983). Dairy India 1983, Dairy India Year Book, New Delhi, PP 63.
2) Islam, M.M., Anjum Shabana, Modi, R.J., Wadhwani, K.N. (2016). Scenario of livestock and poultry in India and their contribution to national economy. International
i. Journal of Science, Environment and Technology, 5 (3): 956 – 965.
3) Randhawa, M.S. (1980). A History of Agriculture in India, Vol.1, Indian Council of
i. Agricultural Research, New Delhi, pp 291.
4) Vikaspedia (2020). https://vikaspedia.in/agriculture/livestock/role-of-livestock-in-indian-economy assessed on 20/11/2020.
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