Bengaluru, DHNS: Karnataka produces more than 76 lakh litres of milk every day, while the share of Bengaluru alone is 15 lakh litres of milk. But Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who has the experience of serving as minister for Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Services, is still not a happy man.

On Thursday, he urged the Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF) to expand its market to other states stating that Nandini diary products were as good as Amul ones.

He was speaking at the inaugural of Rs 34-crore dairy manufacturing unit in Hoskote and foundation stone laying ceremony for a warehouse and marketing office here.

“The state government spends Rs 950 crore every year to provide incentives to milk producers, which is directly deposited to their bank accounts. With the increase of incentive for every litre of milk from Rs 2 in 2008 to Rs 4 in 2013, the state has been able to produce surplus milk,” he said.

He then urged the KMF to make use of surplus milk to make by-products and expand the market to other states. “Compete with Amul, take the Nandini brand outside the state.
This will only be possible if you maintain high quality in all the 64 Nandini products,” he said and gave an example of a Janardhan hotel in Ramanagaram which is famous for its Mysore Pak. Meanwhile, he promised that the state government would not withdraw the scheme of providing incentives to milk producers.

Siddaramaiah mentioned that no person who is engaged in animal husbandry occupation had committed suicide and urged other farmers to take up the dairy farming as a parallel business.

Milk for students
Siddaramaiah said the government is considering the demand of providing milk to school children from the present three days to five days a week. “The government spends Rs 550 crore a year towards providing milk to 1.2 crore school children. We are considering to extend it to five days a week.”

Energy Minister D K Shivakumar said Rs 400 crore has been earmarked to set up a dairy manufacturing unit at Kanakapura in Ramanagaram district. Cooperation Minister H S Mahadeva Prasad and Animal Husbandry minister A Manju also spoke on the occasion.
P Nagaraj, president, KMF said more than 22 lakh dairy farmers are part of the 13,500 co-operative milk producers’ societies in the state.