India the future of global dairy business, potential to boost milk output: IDF chief.
According to Piercristiano Brazzale, President of the International Dairy Federation (IDF), India represents the future of the global dairy business, with enormous potential to boost milk output. He attributed India’s top position to its small farmer-led cooperative dairy model.
Brazzale was in India for the International Dairy Federation’s four-day World Dairy Summit, which was held in Greater Noida from September 12 to 15. The summit will be held in Chicago in 2023, Paris in 2024, and New Zealand in 2025.
With 210 million tonnes of yearly milk production, India produces roughly 23% of global dairy output, with a growth of 6% compared to the global average of 2%. Also Read | PM Modi highlights the contribution of women to India’s dairy sector at IDF WDS.
According to Brazzale, the small farmer-led cooperative dairy model is most suited for India, and numerous cooperatives are utilizing digitalization to improve quality and efficiency.
‘The NDDB [National Dairy Development Board] and cooperatives like Amul and Nandini are also assisting dairy farmers with breeding through genetic enhancement,’ he explained.
Next steps
The IDF chief stated that the Covid-19 outbreak has resulted in beneficial developments for the dairy industry, including state-supported digitalization. ‘Innovation and digitalization are the future in all industries,’ he remarked.
‘The three major issues for the dairy sector are sustainability and environmental effect, animal healthcare, and guaranteed food safety,’ he stated while expressing concern about the problem of concurrency between dairy products and plant-based or copycat products.
Precision fermentation-produced dairy products derived from bacteria and specific milk ingredients such as casein, lactose, pep, and so on are combined to produce a mozzarella-like product that appears to be generated from genuine milk. ‘This is a developing challenge, but it isn’t as important in India right now,’ he continued.
Inflationary Pressures
Brazzale stated that inflation is a major issue that affects stakeholders globally across value chains. Also Read | Amit Shah: NDDB, GCMMF can make India self-sufficient in dairy machinery.
‘We have a major problem in Europe with rising energy prices. The increase in energy costs is equivalent to the entire year’s profit. As a result, the current position of European industry is unsustainable and must be remedied’ he stated
In the middle of India’s inflationary environment, Brazalle believes that increasing milk production efficiency is the solution for Indian dairy farmers. ‘The only way to increase efficiency is to use digitalization and new technology. In addition, with the assistance of the state, we must combat the problem of speculation’ He also stated.
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