Daily collection of milk by the Kolhapur Zilla Dudh Utpadak Sangh, popularly known as Gokul dairy, has crossed the 17.5 lakh litre mark, in the past three years.
The figure is an increase of 6 lakh litres of milk.
Chairman Arun Dongale, told TOI, “Gokul, the largest cooperative dairy of Maharashtra, has now aimed to increase daily collection of milk to 20 lakh litres by 2025.
This increase, through encouraging dairy farmers, is not to compete with bigger dairies such as Amul of Gujarat and Nandini of Karnataka.”
Dongale added, “Gokul dairy is limited to Kolhapur district, while Amul and Nandini are federation of many district level dairies in their respective states. We don’t think these dairies are our competitors, even though they always attempt to replace Gokul from major markets such as in Mumbai and Pune.”
The chairman mentioned maintaining consistency in the quality of milk and products that they manufacture. “We are going to launch another product in February. At the same time, we plan to increase Gokul outlets in other major markets, to ensure the milk we are collecting reaches the customers,” he said.
Around 12 lakh litres of milk is supplied to Mumbai, in pouches of half a litre and 1 litre.
The dairy has started training farmers to increase production and availability of good cow and buffalo breeds at subsidised rates. The dairy also has its own plant to prepare cattle fodder. The capacity of the fodder has also been increased to cater to the growing need of the farmers. “For last three years, we are adding 5,000 farmers in the dairy business. They are provided support to set up and grow their business. Gokul is the only cooperative dairy which also gives the highest price to farmers supplying milk to us,” he said.
