The second phase of the National Dairy Plan (NDP-II), which will focus on supporting smaller milk unions to strengthen their marketing efforts and tackling adulteration in milk, is likely to be finalised soon.

NDDB Chairman Meenesh Shah said the World Bank mission would be in Anand during the second week of July to discuss the NDP-II. “Initial clearances are all done,” Shah said, adding that the World Bank’s support in the form of grant/soft loan for NDP-II is likely to be limited to some 6-7 States and not the entire country. “Now, India’s position has changed. The grant which was available earlier is no longer available. It has to be 50:50 with both Government of India and the World Bank contributing equally to the project.

In NDP- Phase 1, we got 90 per cent of the soft loan from the World Bank,” Shah said. The size of the NDP-Phase II is likely to be in the range of ₹.1,200-1,500 crore.

Focus of 2nd phase

Shah said the project’s second phase would focus on enhancing milk’s testing mechanism, digitising milk tankers to control adulteration in transit and manure management besides providing support to smaller milk unions to strengthen marketing, among others. The project may support co-operatives for ethno-veterinary medicine to care of common diseases and also focus on earlier activities like improving village coverage and adding more farmers to the co-operative network.

The NDP-I, with an outlay of ₹.2,242 crore was implemented during March 2012 to November 2019 across 18 major dairying States. NDP-I focussed on enhancing the productivity of milch animals and providing market access to milk producers.

Source : The Hindu Businessline July 5th 2022