Union Agriculture Minister Shri Radha Mohan Singh has requested the Chief Ministers of Bihar, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan to encourage free milk to school children. He also congratulated Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh to have implemented the schemes to raise the nutritional level of school children.
In the review meeting it was found that the State Milk Federation have surplus stocks of skimmed milk powder and in the interest of farmers and the country’s milk producers, cooperatives purchase of milk has continued, Minister said.
The letter read “You may be aware of School Milk Programme running successfully across the developed world which encourages children to consume dairy products and maintain a balanced diet regime. Milk, Yoghurt, cheese, buttermilk and other milk products that are important from the point of view of good nutrition and balanced diet, are provided to school children under the programme.”
He assured that there are surplus stock of skimmed milk powder with the State Milk Federation. The higher stocks of milk products with the cooperatives have resulted in reducing the working capital. In the interest of farmers and milk producers’ of the country, the cooperatives have continued procuring milk but they are working under severe constraint of working capital.
Milk contributes close to a third of the gross income of rural households and in the case of those without land it contributes, it estimates nearly half of their gross income. Further, 90% of farmers have a herd size of 2 or less and 69% of the dairy farmers are small & marginal. Introducing school milk scheme would help farmers and milk cooperatives owned by farmers a ready and steady market for their produce, read the Minister’s letter.