World Milk Day is established by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations and has been celebrated across the world on the 1st June every year since 2001. This day was established to recognise the importance of milk as a global food and to raise awareness regarding the importance of the dairy sector. World Milk Day also provides an opportunity to bring attention to activities that are related to dairy sector. This year is the 21st anniversary of World Milk Day.
At the very beginning, Milk day was observed in 2001 around the world. In that year, many countries participated in this event. This important day commemorates the contributions of the Dairy sector to sustainability, economic development, livelihoods and nutrition. Every year, the number of countries participating in this event is increasing.
This day is going to be celebrated worldwide with the objectives to disseminate information about the need and importance of milk in a human being’s life. To acknowledge the contributions of several sectors in fulfilling the needs of milk and dairy products is also a part of it. Various programs and activities are planned on this day to educate people about the nutrients that are present in milk like calcium, protein, vitamin B2, potassium, etc.
Every year, World Milk Day is celebrated with a unique theme. The theme for World Milk Day 2021 is focused on ‘Sustainability in the Dairy Sector, along with Empowering the Environment, Nutrition, and Socio- Economic’. This theme aims to spread more awareness and encourage everyone about incorporating milk and dairy products regularly into our diet. This year, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) also plans to re-introduce dairy farming to the global community by helping to create a low-carbon future for the dairy industries.
Milk is considered as the super-food, as it has many important nutrients that offer significant benefits to our body. It has salts like potassium, sodium, calcium, and also has vitamin B12 and many essential nutrients. We consider milk as the rich source of calcium that protects us from bone damage and deterioration. Vitamin B12 is essential for brain and DNA health and keeps us energetic. Milk can calm the nerves and soothe the mind as it has an exorbitant amount of potassium and magnesium. Milk is a superb source of protein that our body needs regularly. It helps to make hormones, enzymes and build muscles. Milk is also good for our skin. It moisturises our skin and nourishes effectively.
Milk plays a very significant role in our health and also helps many people to generate income out of it. Still, Bangladesh is lagging far behind in achieving self-sufficiency in milk production. As per data available with the Department of Livestock Services (DLS), the demand of milk in 2019-20was 152.02 Lakh metric ton, and the production was 106.80 Lakh metric ton. The availability of milk during that year was 175.63 ml/day/capita against the minimum requirement of 250 ml/day/capita. This means our local production can fulfil only around 70% of the required quantity.
To increase the availability of milk to the consumer depends on the supply of adequate quantity of milk with affordable price. Only the responsible actions of the top-most processors, dairy farmers, and other marketing agencies can ensure this. Only 9% of the total milk production is delivered to the processors and the remaining 91% is traded informally.
As Bangladesh is currently deficient in liquid milk production and a net importing country for powder milk, the government has already taken some projects to increase milk production to a level that leads to becoming self-sufficient in the near future. If we analyse the statistical data available in the DLS regarding the yearly growth of milk production, we can assume that attaining self-sufficiency in milk production will require more than 12 years.
To attain self-sufficiency in milk production, we need to focus on faster growth of our dairy farming.But unfortunately, there are various issues hindering faster growth of our dairy farming. There is a huge shortage of high-yielding cows and lands for dairy farms. People involved with dairy farming are not technically sound and do not have advanced knowledge of handling milk. Besides these, high-cost labour and lack of treatment and transportation facilities are also a major challenge.
Further more, due to lack of infrastructure and transportation facility, transferring milk from the farmers’ end to the demand centres is very costly and difficult. For this, farmers don’t get the reasonable price of milk. As there are not enough milk processing facilities in our country, the dairy farm owners are compelled to sell the bulk amount of milk at a cheaper price to the nearby tea stalls and sweetmeat producers. Institutional support to expand milk supplies and marketing for rural areas can minimise this problem. Therefore, considering the extreme perishability and bulkiness of milk available from widely scattered rural sources, a National Milk Grid should be established with an efficient method of milk collection, processing and distribution to urban consumers.
For the faster growth of dairy sector government should provide easy and low-cost credit facility for the farmers along with subsidy in feed and veterinary medicines. Government should also take necessary measures to improve breed of high yielding cows. It is very important to establish a Dairy Development Board soon to promote this important sector. We highly need formulation and proper implementation of a comprehensive national dairy policy for the dairy development in the country and sustaining milk for the producer and the consumer.
Md. Khalilur Rahman Sajal
Executive Director
Voluntary Consumers Training and Awareness Society (VOCTA)
Email: sajal.voctabangladesh@gmail.com