Agriculture Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage yesterday said that the Agriculture Ministry is ready to provide tax relief, low-interest loans, land, and all other necessary assistance to local investors who are interested in dairy farming.
The Minister said that by increasing the production of liquid milk and encouraging people to consume liquid milk, a large amount of funds that is spent to import powdered milk could be saved annually.
He was speaking at a workshop on the challenges and methods of promoting liquid milk production, held at the BMICH in Colombo yesterday.
“People in Sri Lanka need 720 million litres of liquid milk annually for consumption. However, the annual production of liquid milk in our country is around 420 million litres. Of that, our people consume very little. They also buy milk from rural dairy farmers and sell it to companies. I invite young people to open liquid milk outlets in major cities including Colombo. We are ready to provide all necessary assistance for such ventures,” he said. “The Animal Production and Health Department has been working for long to raise milk production in the country or to increase the import of powdered milk. Farmers involved in dairy farming in the recent past have not been able to obtain dairy cows to be artificially inseminated due to a shortage of officers for this task. There are 600 such vacancies. We have talked to the Finance Ministry this year and we hope to fill all the vacancies and increase the production and consumption of liquid milk in the country by 80 percent by 2024,” the Minister said.
State Minister of Livestock Development P.B. Herath said that dairy farmers could be educated to increase the current milk production. This will increase the amount of liquid milk produced locally by about 25 percent by 2022.
“Increasing the production and consumption of liquid milk has now been announced as a Government policy. Accordingly, funds have been allocated to our State Ministry for the year 2022. Until 1977, the consumption of liquid milk was at a high level. Due to the actions of successive governments, the production and consumption of liquid milk have come down. According to the policy statement of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, we have been entrusted with the task of increasing the production of liquid milk for a healthy population and are vigorously implementing a programme to motivate the people to consume it. We must remember with gratitude the support given to us by Agriculture Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage in fulfilling this responsibility. His guidance in transforming dairy farmers in particular into entrepreneurs is a great strength to the State Ministry,” he said.
courtesy dailynews
