REASONS BEHIND MODERN DAIRY FARMING FAILURES IN INDIA
There has been huge interest in dairy farming as a business in INDIA in the last 10 years. Thausands of dairy farms were opened with most modern design, equipment and best breed animals. But not even 50% of those dairy farms are operational now. Frankly speaking, professional dairy farming has gone through a crisis in INDIA in the last 10 years. The intent of this article is not to demotivate new dairy farmers but to genuinely analyse the reasons for failures of many dairy farms.
Reasons for failures of modern dairy farms in INDIA
India’s ongoing milk crisis has been pushing small dairy farmers out of business and helping dairy multinationals to expand at their expense.
Global crisis, local impact
The global slump in skimmed milk powder (SMP) prices since 2015, according to the report, is a result of China and Russia stopping import of SMP. It created glut in the EU and sent ripples in the global market. The situation worsened after April 2015 when the EU scrapped its milk quota, which regulates the production of milk and control its overproduction. The increase in production of milk in these countries has affected export of SMP from India.
The Indian dairy companies had attempted to dispose of SMP stocks in domestic market after recombining it with butter fat and converting it back to liquid milk. It led to slump in procurement price of milk in domestic market.
The availability of this milk further depressed the procurement prices. This development was ignored by the Indian government, and import was allowed without additional regulation.
Less money from milk is pushing small dairy farmers in debt. While this trend is global, Indian farmers have not received any support from the government even as their counterparts in the EU and USA have.
Bad for producer and consumer
The decision of private dairies and cooperatives to dispose SMP in the domestic market led to a price war, resulting in a further fall of prices and even lower procurement price.
While cheaper milk brought temporary relief to the consumers, the quality of milk available is poorer. The milk made from SMP has lower nutritional value as compared to fresh milk. Fresh milk is richer in vitamins and minerals than SMP. Moreover, a consumer is not able to determine the age of milk.
Indian farmer unprotected
Dip in price due to surplus in global market has given opportunity to big companies to expand into other countries. It pushed small dairy farmers out of the market but helped big corporations and cooperatives to expand their business. Small dairy farmers are the backbone of India’s milk production.
Our international counterparts such as the USA, EU and New Zealand have strategies in place to address the issue of plenty of low-priced milk in the market. They have started capturing the world market through investment, mergers and partnership across the globe.
The local and small dairy farmers became contract-based workers for big corporations. They have now become more vulnerable as they are now part of ecologically unsustainable production strategies.
Resilience in locally dependent markets
The informal people’s market, which link local producers via small vendors to local consumers which operating within 10-30 kilometres, have not been affected severly.
The procurement prices for small farmers have reduced even as the cost of production increased due to drought.
https://www.pashudhanpraharee.com/reasons-behind-modern-dairy-farming-failures-in-india/
Below are a list of reasons for failures for new dairy farms:
- Started by people who did not have any knowledge on dairy farming.
There were 4 groups of people who started modern dairy farms. First group were the local people who suddenly became rich (by whatever means) and had surplus cash. The second group were the NRI’s who pumped in their hard earned money. The third group were the software professionals who were frusted with their jobs and wanted to get back to their farming roots. The fourth group were the unemployed educated youth from upper middle-class families. All the four groups of people never had any kind of dairy farming experience. (some never touched a cow or a buffalo before!!!) All of them had good intentions and wanted to apply modern design and technology. But nothing works, if you don’t know how to differentiate a male and a female buffalo.
- People got into dairy farming for money.
As the name (dairy farming) suggests, dairy farming is a type of farming and farming is not business (in pure sense). Dairy farming is not a business but a passion. Primarily, new dairy farmers failed to understand that they were dealing with live animals and not some machines. Farming requires extensive knowledge and tons of patience. Many of the failed dairy farms were started by highly educated people. Most of these people built castles in the air. These people used excel sheets and project management principles into dairy farming. This is not bad but that alone is not good enough. Many new dairy farmers stupidly calculated that a buffalo will give 12 liters of milk for 365 days.
- Big bang formula.
Most of the hitech farms went for a bing bang formula. They constructed huge sheds and bought large number of animals at one go. When you are new to dairy farming and have a large herd, it is very difficult to manage problems. The procurement of animals should have been staggered to maintain consistent monthly milk yield. Some even made the mistake of setting up high end processing plants when their farm did not even produce a single drop of milk.
- Not understanding reproductive cycle.
Many new farmers after procuring the animals were only focussing on milking. Most of them did not have the knowledge that the animal should conceive by 4th or 5th month after calving. They did not know how to detect heat and surprisingly even those farms that had large number of lactating buffaloes did not have a bull in the farm. So they were totally dependent on local government vetinary doctors for artificial insemination which led to missing heat cycles. By the time these new dairy farmers realised the mistake, the animals were already in their 8th or 9th month of milking. If you have 50 animals and if most of them are not pregnant and are in 8th month of milking – it means they have to feed 50 non-milking animals for next 9 to 10 months which obviously resulted in huge losses.
- Not taking care of calves
Many of these failed farms did not take proper care of the calves. Proper care of female calves is very very important for being successful in the long term. I have seen farms with 100 lactating buffaloes but only with 20 to 30 calves. Rest of the calves were already dead. This might not be a big issue in the short term but huge loss in the long term. All successful dairy farmers will tell you the value of female calves because these will start giving milk in 3 to 4 years.
- Improper feed and fodder management
Many farmers provided good feed (dhana) and fodder(grass,hay) during initial phase. When milk yield reduced after 5 or 6 months, these guys reduced the feed and fodder. Some people cut down the feed so drastically that the animals were half the size. Feeding is according to body weight and yield of the animal. During dry months you can cut down feed a bit but should not reduce it drastically. Due to nutritional imbalanes, the animals had health and reproductive issues.
- Failure of automation and labour problems
Most new farm owners wanted to fully automate the farms. It’s difficult to adapt the hand-milked buffaloes to milking machines which requires time and patience. When it did not work the way they planned they just discarded the milking machines and other machinery. I have seen farm after farm with unused milking machines. And when suddenly workers who milk quit, it’s a nightmare situation.
- Depending on others
Many owners depended on others to take care of the farm who themselves did not have much knowledge on dairy farming. Dairy farming requires owners attention 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year. Others will not be able to do that for you. If you can’t spend time on your farm (atleast till the farm operations stabilises), please do not get into dairy farming.
- Easy exit paths
Since the farms were mostly started by people with surplus cash or had the capability to go back to their original professions, when things did not go well, they just shut down the farms. The sad part was that they created a bad name for dairy farming and even worse was that the best breed animals were sent for slaughtering (cutting). If these people did not have easy exit paths, they would have hung around and made it successful. One should have the will-power to stick around for the long-term when things are not going your way.
Conclusion
The intent of this article is not to frighten people who want to get into dairy farming but to learn from other’s failures. Dairy farming is only for people who are passionate about it. It requires time and lots of patience to be successful in dairy farming.
https://www.agrifarming.in/reasons-for-dairy-farming-failure-and-malpractices
