Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), India’s largest dairy cooperative has started to procure approximately 700,000 – 800,000 litres of milk daily from dairy farmers outside of Gujarat to meet demand. The cooperative plans to increase its procurement from outside Gujarat from its current 7-8% of total procurement to 50% of total procurement so as to benefit a greater number of farmers. The cooperative pays its farmers up to $9 per 100kg of milk. NEW DELHI: India’s leading milk cooperative which sells its dairy products under the brand name “Amul”, in a strategic move, has been procuring milk from outside its birth place Gujarat to corner the growing dairy market.
“We are procuring 7-8 lakh litres of milk daily from outside Gujarat for over last six months,” R S Sodhi, Managing Director of Amul’s body Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), told PTI over phone.
This is in addition to procurement of about One crore litres of milk daily from within Gujarat, Sodhi added.
Formed in 1946, the Anand (Gujarat) based GCMMF, the market leader of milk in the country, is purchasing milk from Maharashtra, West Bengal, Bihar, Haryana and Rajasthan,the MD said.
Earlier, the cooperative, which spurred white revolution in the country, used to cater the milk needs of the entire country from Gujarat itself.
Milk is purchased strictly from dairy cooperative and not from individual or other agency, he said.
Sodhi said “though procurement of milk outside Gujarat is low at present at around 7-8 per cent of the total procurement, we wish to increase it to 50 per cent to give benefits to dairy farmers outside Gujarat too”.
He said presently the cooperative is concentrating on these five states, but would expand to others later on.
GCMMF pays between Rs 392-400 per 100 kgs to farmers for milk both within Gujarat and outside, he said.
Asked about strategies to meet the summer demand, Sodhi said the dairy major has worked out a strategy as the demand for milk was expected to rise by about 5-10 per cent during the period.
“To meet the summer demand rise we will concentrate on production of milk, butter milk and curds and cut down production of products like milk powder, butter, cheese and ice cream ,” he added.
Amul is the largest food brand in India and world’s largest pouched milk brand with an annual turnover of USD 1700 million in 2009-10.
Besides India, Amul has entered overseas markets such as Mauritius, UAE, USA, Bangladesh, Australia, China, Singapore, Hong Kong and a few South African countries.
Normal 0 false false false EN-GB X-NONE X-NONE
http://www.amul.com/index1original.html