The Assam government has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) to form a joint venture business to carry out a Rs 2,000 crore project.

The initiative seeks to process 10 lakh gallons of milk per day, which will assist the state’s 1.75 lakh dairy farmers. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that six new milk processing plants would be built in the next seven years to boost dairy farmers’ revenues. Milk from over 4,100 dairy cooperative societies will be processed, packed, and marketed in the six new planned milk processing plants.

More than 15,000 high-milk-yielding Gir cows will be brought into Assam as part of this dairy development initiative, ensuring increased returns to dairy producers. The plan also provided for the creation of infrastructure in Assam for the production of cattle feed and silage. Two cattle-feed and organic manure production plants will also be created under this MoU, which was signed in the presence of Union Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying Minister Parshottam Rupala.

Artificial insemination and the import of high-yielding cow breeds will also be pursued. On Friday, the foundation stone for the Purabi Dairy expansion project was set under the World Bank-funded Assam Agribusiness and Rural Transportation Project, which would raise the dairy’s production capacity from 60,000 to 1.5 lakh litres per day.

The Chief Minister stated that dairy farmers will be compensated for market price changes in their products and asked all dairy cooperatives to engage in healthy competition for the sake of Assam’s economic growth.

Source : News track live Jan 8th 2022 by Nikesh Mandal