215 crore Meghalaya Milk Mission launched by Radha Mohan Singh

Pashu Sandesh, 30^th July 2018

Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Radha Mohan Singh said that Meghalaya Milk Mission will facilitate in achieving the Centre’s goal of doubling farmer’s income by 2022 through promotion of milk business in the state. Announcing a sanctioned project of Rs215 crores through National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) at the launching program of Meghalaya Milk Mission in Shillong yesterday, the minister said that the amount will be utilized for various activities like training, dairy farm, chilling centre and purchase of milch animal.

The minister said that the Meghalaya Milk Mission has been conceptualized to plug the demand-supply gap in the per capita milk availability. Stating that the per capita milk availability in Meghalaya is much lower than the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR’s) recommendation of milk consumption per person, the minister said that the Milk Mission will enable the state to substitute the import of milk with the state’s own production.

The minister mentioned that there are cooperatives in only 97 villages out of the 6449 villages of Meghalaya, while there can be cooperative societies in 60 per cent of the total villages. The minister said that the Milk Mission will generate alternate livelihoods for the rural people of Meghalaya through diary sector. 2000 farmers will be directly benefitted by this Mission over the next four years, he said.

The project consists of 2000 dairy farm units, in one unit there is provision for purchase of 5 cows, shed constructions, storage room construction, animal insurance, 79 bulk milk coolers of 500 litre capacity, 13 milk tankers of 3000 litre capacity etc. There is also a provision of Rs 1 crore for the training of farmers in the project. The launch of the Mission, the minister said, will benefit Meghalaya immensely.

Governor of Meghalaya Shri Ganga Prasad said that the Mission is a comprehensive one, with essential components that cover both induction of new cows and development of indigenous cattle by selective breeding. The Governor expressed his satisfaction that the Mission takes care of all aspects of dairy sector including the induction of modern chilling infrastructure.

The program was also attended by Managing Director NCDC Shri Sundeep Kumar, Commissioner & Secretray (AH&Vety) Shri Sampath Kumar, Govt of Meghalaya senior official of the Central and State Government, president of the Shillong Milk Union and cooperators of various Dairy cooperative of the state.

A bull fair was also organized in the venue in line with the launching of the Meghalaya Milk Mission.