It’s 6 in the morning while we ride through Paroda, over the makeshift bridge that crosses over the Khuswati River. The roads are foggy, deserted and the cold gush of wind makes it a harsh climate for Goans to be awake, leave alone doing any business. As we ride through Paroda and hit the Colomb- Cavrem-Cotombi-Maina-Rivona road, in the pockets of each village, there are a few people awake and toiling.
Chandrakant Naik is one such man, who owns a dairy farm. Clad in dirty work clothes and a woolen monkey cap to shield his head and ears from the fog, he’s busy working in his cow shed. He’s mighty agitated, as our vehicle enters his property.
“You may come to meet me but you can’t ride a noisy bike into my cowshed. You’ve scared my water buffalos, that too when I was milking them. Slight anxiety means she tightens her muscles and then it’s hard to milk them,” explains Chandrakant.
He is one of the poor dairy farmers who have been in the business for over 20-years and toils every morning. He explains to us that from 18 cows and buffaloes, he only has eight now as it’s very difficult for him to survive in this business.
“It’s so difficult to arrange fodder and feed for my cattle. The feed that Goa dairy provides has large quantities of sand in it to make volume and that obviously makes my cattle ill. I am fed of this business but what to do, it’s been my occupation for many years and now it’s too late for me to get into anything else,” asserted Chandrakant, who hopes that the dairy farmer’s plight will change and he will get a better rate for his milk. Chandrakant who’s making time for us while also working is worried if he will finish milking the buffaloes before 8am since he has to drop the milk to the Kotombi, Shree Mahamaya Dairy Cooperative Society which will sell his milk to the Goa Dairy Cooperative.
Like Chandrakant, Dilip Hegde is also a dairy farmer turned activist, who lost his cattle in 2009 to a flood and had huge dairy debts and had to quit the dairy business.
“There’s so much being spoken about SUMUL coming to Goa. But at the ground level, you need to understand how milk supply from the cattle shed to the milk dairy cooperative works and the red tape in Goa. It is only then one will understand if we need more dairies in Goa or not and also how viable dairy farming in Goa is,” asserted Hegde.
He explains that the price of milk is based on fat testing and the solid, not fats content. “The milk testing machine is fed with samples of the milk and the results are generally known later in the day or the next day. It’s because in Goa, most dairy societies that purchase milk used outdated machines. So the rate that the society offers ranges between Rs 13 to Rs 27 based on the fat content.
So one has to be obedient to the Society secretary and Goa Dairy or the farmer is given a terrible rate or told the next day that the milk went bad which then fetches a meagre amount of Rs 2. Hence, one doesn’t raise objections for milk that fetches an average of Rs 25 a day. In this way, dairy farmers won’t complaint of bad feed, medicines not made available, veterinary doctors not coming for house visits or improper measures.
Sushila Dessai, an accountant, along with an assistant works at Goa’s first and only fully women run dairy cooperative at Kotombi. She says that she comes twice a day along with her assistant to collect milk in the morning and evening from dairy farmers, measures it, keeps samples for the fat testers, clears their payments, stocks Goa Dairy feed and sells it and maintains the book of accounts.
“For all this, I get only a Rs 7,000 salary. We manage between 400 litres to 1000 litres a day. And the milk collection job is continuous, with no holidays and leave. I used to earn Rs 2000 till 2010 and now got a hike. I have been here for the last 18 years. Neither Goa Dairy, nor my own cooperative associated to Goa Dairy does anything about our welfare though we ensure that the Goa Dairy tanker gets its milk twice a day,” explains Sushila.
But accountants like Sushila in every village cooperative are accused of corruption. Sushila herself goes home with six to eight litres of milk daily, siphoned from the stock of poor dairy farmers. We notice that Sushila and other such accountants at the Cavrem Dairy Society also insist that the milk is poured into the container in measures of one liter only. The rule is that the measure would overflow and only then milk will be put in the common tank. This way, a dairy farmer who brings 25 litres after the overflow measures only 18 litres and he’s paid only for 18 litres with a loss of 5-7 litres. This excess milk is siphoned by the secretary of the dairy cooperation and sold in the open market or supplied to homes on a daily basis.
“All this is an unfair practice. So that way, it’s good that SUMUL comes to Goa and we have another dairy which will treat us better and give us a better rate and break the corruption and monopoly of Goa Dairy. Also, to keep the yield going from the cow, once in 21 days she has to undergo artificial insemination or AI in dairy terminology. That needs a vet to come and perform a procedure. Now Goa Dairy’s vets or Directorate of Animal Husbandry vets are never available for the same and so many times we miss the 21 day period and milk yield drops. Who will compensate us for this loss? These government vets come, sign in the morning, then say they’re going on field visits and go for private practice. Poor farmers like us are left to their mercy and we have to watch our cattle die without assistance from Goa Dairy,” explains Laxmikant Dessai, Colomb’s senior farmer who sells his milk to the cooperative and then supplies the rest within the village for a price.
“I sell around 25 to 30 liters to the cooperative dairy and that is my stable income, the rest I distribute in the village. My distribution rate is Rs 40 a liter. The dairy buys my milk for Rs 27 per liter. But I don’t have the means to distribute all in the open market on my cycle or I would prefer direct sale and not give anything to the dairy,” asserts Laxmikant to the Herald. Laxmikant, at 8am has to cover around 20 houses and distribute his milk before the temperature rises and hence is in a rush.
“Dairy Cooperative secretaries work as LIC agents and force farmers to insure and take policies at high premiums on their cattle. Any resistance means milk is not accepted or declared spoilt or milk with low fat content and we’re accused of adding water to it. You raise your voice against the feed or the unavailability of medicines or complain about the doctor at Goa dairy, the outcome is the same or your milk is rejected. It’s a perishable item and the endpoint is to make money from the milk. I also was a Dairy Society secretary and I had to work for Goa Dairy, to push their insurance policies and bad quality feed. So we’re at the mercy of Goa Dairy which is a vicious monopoly,” explains Devidas Naik from Pirla who hopes SUMUL will provide better assistance.
Milk shakes, faloodas and desserts come from the toil of the dairy farmer
While life looks easy in the towns and we debate milk quality, milk produce, supply shortfall, milk prices and double fat milk, life in the hinterland is different. The dairy toils 24×7 to get a meagre income of hardly Rs 675 to Rs 1000 a day.
4.30 am, we notice the dairy farmer wakes up and milks the cows or buffaloes. Milk is perishable and needs to be treated with utmost care and hygiene. The cowshed needs to be washed of urine and flushed out of dung. The cow and her udder are washed and bathed, wiped and then the milking process begins in absolute silence without disturbing the cow or she starts kicking and milking will be delayed. “I have arthritis in the joints of my fingers. It’s 20 years of holding cow udder and milking them. My fingers hurt but what to do, the milk is my livelihood. Also after milking, the pores are open and we have to wait for a while. If the cow sits soon after milking, then she will get mastitis which means the udder turns hard and the cow cannot be milked and there is no cure for it. So we have to wait with the cow post milking,” explains Devidas from his Pirla home.
Upar Vellip at the Cavrem Dairy Society which now has a freezer and can send milk to Goa Dairy once in 2 days explains to us that dairy yield has a season where yield is high in the monsoons since a lot of natural grass which is high in protein is available during the monsoons while in the summers and winter, the yield drops by 40% which means, a dairy farmer’s earning post monsoons drops by 40% while his expense for feed increases.
“The cow shed is very slippery and the cow slips often and her hip can fracture and she dies. So to prevent a fall, rubber mats costing thousands of rupees needs to be bought and put on the floor. There’s the expense of fodder, buying hay, grass, calcium, other feeds, the rubber mats, spending on an automatic milking machine which needs to washed thoroughly or it gets worms. We can’t got out anywhere because the udder has to be milked daily and the cows cannot be left alone. They have to be taken for grazing, for a walk and all this on a daily basis,” explains Hegde as we walk through Rivona. Huge mining pits of the past is what is an eye sore in Rivona but spilled milk on the roadside means a lot of milk tankers commute through the village and dairy is a business in the village.
“At night, the cow will move, and then sit. If she sighs, you know she’s resting, if she doesn’t it means she fell and then I’ve got to run. So tending to cattle is a 24×7 job but our government provides no assistance to farmers,” explains a dairy farmer who doesn’t want to be named.
“A cow or water buffalo of the jersey or any other good bread costs around Rs 60,000 and its maintenance is a lot as we have to ensure the cow grows by at least half a kg daily. So imagine the burden and pressure on a dairy farmer and then multiply that by five or ten animals,” asserts Dr Satyavan Naik, the veterinary doctor in charge at the Quepem Animal Husbandry Hospital.
Milk a cow, store it properly, manage the feed, clean the cow shed, cut the grass and fodder on machine, carry the milk on a rickety cycle for sale, maintain records of milk yield and milk sold and pay off the loans taken to purchase the animal, is a huge burden of a dairy farmer while Goa Dairy which is supposed to be a dairy of the stakeholders, does nothing that stands out. Even worse, Rivona, Pirla, Cavrem and Cotombi are four veterinary sub centers serviced by the Quepem Animal Husbandry Hospital and also the Goa Dairy doctors.
