Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has announced his government’s plans to bring milk revolution, ‘paala velluva or ksheera viplavam’, in the State by providing one buffalo each to about two lakhs member farmers of all cooperative dairies.
“The scheme will be grounded within two months and the milk producers of the cooperative dairies given one buffalo each with 50% subsidy”, the Chief Minister said while speaking to a gathering of milk producers at his camp office Pragathi Bhavan here on Sunday.
The Scheduled Caste, and Scheduled Tribe members of the cooperative dairies would, however, be given 75% subsidy.
As being done in case of the sheep units supply scheme, the beneficiaries of the buffalo scheme would also be given freedom to make choice on the breed of animal they want to go for and the subsidy would be routed through the cooperative dairy societies.
He suggested that the milk producers go for local breeds as the breeds from far-off areas would struggle to cope with the weather conditions in the State.
When asked, a few representatives of milk producers told the Chief Minister that one good buffalo would cost anything between ₹50,000 and ₹60,000.
Stating that the scheme would require about ₹500 crore for implementation, the Chief Minister hoped that it would improve milk production in the State, supply to cooperative dairies, from the existing 7 lakh litres a day to 10 lakh litres a day in six months’ time.
He also asked the milk producers of the cooperative dairies to raise six plants (seedlings and saplings) at their homes and name them after the family members so that proper care like regular watering was taken.
Against huge requirement of about one-crore litres of milk every day its production in the State was very limited and the State was also getting supplies from Karnataka (6 lakh litres a day), Andhra Pradesh (4 lakh litres) and Gujarat (2 lakh litres) every day to meet the demand in Hyderabad and a few other urban areas.
The Chief Minister stated that he would conceive a larger scheme for providing buffalo units along with fodder chopping machines, supply of fodder seed on regular basis and educating them on new techniques of fodder raising as part of the larger scheme that would cover every farmer.
The Chief Minister criticised the Opposition parties for flaying every scheme being taken up by the Government and said:
“They did not even think about such scheme when they were in power all these years but opposing them blindly without even understanding the benefits that accrue to the beneficiaries”.
Minister for Animal Husbadry T. Srinivas Yadav, Vijaya Dairy Development Cooperative Federation Chairman Loka Bhuma Reddy, MPs G. Sukhender Reddy, B. Vinod Kumar and others were present.
