Akshayakalpa Farms and Foods Pvt. Ltd., headed by veterinarian G.N.S. Reddy, has begun work on supplying organic milk to Bangalore. It has tied up with a private firm to market the product. “It is still market testing period. We have fixed the price at Rs. 50 per litre. The cost will be revised soon,” Dr. Reddy said. He said the price had been fixed scientifically.
Every cost, including labour cost of farmer and his family members, has been taken into account to fix the price. “All these years we have talked about only support price in the agriculture sector. Support price is different from scientific price. Farmers require scientific price, not the support price,” he said.
The company has plans to extend the project to Chikmagalur, Chitradurga, Bangalore Rural and Chikballapur. “Akshayakalpa plans to establish milk processing capacity of 10 lakh litres in next five years,” he said.
The company has purchased 24 acres of land at Kodihalli in Channarayapatna for the purpose. The interesting part of the whole exercise is that the promoters have taken a pledge not to pay bribe at any level in the process. “We had to face hardship at every level because of our commitment. We purchased the land at the market price and paid the registration charges accordingly. But a few officers were reluctant to support us. But we are committed to our pledge and continue with that,” Shashi Kumar said.
Those interested to know more about the venture can visit www.akshayakalpa.org
Sathish G.T.
