Dairy digitisation -Part1
How digitisation helps farmers get fair price for milk while empowering consumers
India is at cross roads & so is the innovation index. Digital platforms are playing major roles in not only identifying the gaps in the traditional processes, but creating layers of solutions that not only fills the gaps, but ensures smooth scaling in multiple directions. Up course reduction in cost & time is significant among other benefits. One area where technology can play huge role is the dairy industry. Traditionally, Indian dairy industry is dominated by either families or private players. Dis-Organised it is, dairy industry also lacks technology push at various levels. Private players did bring the farmers onto focus, but not without extracting their pound of hard flesh that cuts the margins of farmers harmfully. Most intriguing problems in dairy/agriculture industry like Milk/Food Adulteration , Neglected Farmers , Poor animal care , High cost of feed, Market Volatility ,Difficult Loans , Jobs/Rural Skill development can be solved through Technology that connects farmers & consumers, holistically handles the transactions , empowers farmers with information to make right decisions can definitely solve some of these problems for sure. How can technology help farmers,consumers,animals,environment in this case ? Lets understand some basics of real milk to begin with.
What is Real Milk ?
Real Milk is the milk that is straight from the Live Stock, no middle men & no impurities along the path. Real Milk is pure & fresh as it is given by Mother Nature. With all the goodness of essential nutrients in their purest form that Mother Nature can give to humans.
Is consuming Real Milk healthy ?
Real Milk gives consumers the benefit of nutrients that are in its purest of natural form. Commercial vendors would add various preservatives that can to an extent contaminate the essential goodness of milk. There are innumerable people who would want a Cow/Buffalo to be milked in their house holds; Technology would make this possible in a different way by supplying that very pure & un-adulterated milk right into your door step
How does buying RealMilk directly from farmers help farmers/animals ?
Farmers produce milk using livestock. The cost of producing one liter of milk far exceeds what the farmer is paid for. There are various reasons which include the middle tier processing & brands occupying markets. Buying milk directly from farmers gives them the Single Tier Sales Benefit which is optimum price for the milk. This will also reduce cost to the consumers who pay less when compared to the commercial brands. Live Stock need very good care which is made possible when farmers get fair price for the milk they produce.
What are the economic benefits of digital ecosystem that connects farmers with consumers?
Farmers get fair price for their milk production efforts. Consumers get to consume real fresh milk at affordable cost. Live Stock get to have better care resulting in more milk production (Cows/Buffalos would be healthy enough to reproduce more frequently resulting in increased quality milk production, thus profits to farmers & low cost fresh milk to consumers).
Enables Jobs Creation (Both Urban & Rural) as the Milk Consumption prospects spread across various sectors of industry. Every Liter of milk a dairy farmer produces adds 100 Rupees to local economy. For every 10 dairies (cows/buffaloes) there are 2 Jobs in the community. Every cow/buffalo adds 1.8 to 2 lakh rupees/year to the global economy.
While there are numerous other things to be discussed about digital platforms changing dairy industry, we shall continue the story in our next session with even more interesting details. Stay hooked !
