Jaipur, June 01 (Hindustan Times). India, which is called agriculture and animal husbandry based economy, has made a better place in the field of animal husbandry as well. Dairy sector in animal husbandry is of great importance for India in various ways. As an industry, it is providing employment to more than 80 million rural households. These include mostly small and marginal farmers as well as landless people. The special thing is that women in our country are playing an active role in this field. This sector plays a leading role in women empowerment especially along with providing employment opportunities for women.
There has been a significant increase in the production and consumption of milk and dairy products in India in the last nine years. Presently India is the largest producer of milk in the world, contributing 24 percent of the global milk production. Within the last nine years, milk production in the country has increased by 61 percent. While the country used to produce 137.7 million tonnes of milk in 2013-14, the figure is expected to increase to 221.1 million tonnes in 2021-22. Not only this, as a result of the major steps taken by the Government of India for the development of this sector, the per capita availability of milk has increased by 1.5 times in 9 years. The per capita availability of milk increased from 303 grams per day in 2013-14 to 444 grams per day in the year 2021-22. According to statistics, till March 15, 2023, Rajasthan is the highest milk producing state in the country. Rajasthan contributes 15.05 percent to the total milk production of the country.
The dairy sector has been a major contributor to the development of the rural economy in India. The government through its various initiatives has facilitated the infrastructure of dairy farming. The Central Government is providing facilities like ‘Dairy Processing and Infrastructure Development Fund’ to upgrade the infrastructure of the dairy sector, ‘Kisan Credit Card’ to provide adequate and timely credit support to the farmers. The ‘Rashtriya Gokul Mission’ has been launched by the government to promote milk production. Thus, the Government of India is making every possible effort to make the dairy sector profitable for the farmers.
