Indian milk products to see price rise

By Ankush Chibber

- Last updated on GMT

Related tags Milk India

Milk prices have almost doubled in two years
Milk prices have almost doubled in two years
The price of milk and milk-based products in India is set to surge on the back of a variety of natural and human factors, including a shortage of rainfall in the monsoon months.

Over the last two years, retail milk prices in India have been steadily rising. Back in 2009, milk was still averaging around 16 rupees a litre. But since then, it has seen almost a doubling with milk now being priced at around 30 rupees a litre.

According to an official at Amul, the brand name for Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd. and India's largest manufacturer of milk, prices of milk and milk-based products are set to rise significantly over the next one year.

“We just raised the price of our retail milk by 2 rupees and might see another rise within a year,”​ said the official, who declined to be identified in the media.

According to local media reports in business dailies, other dairy majors like Mother Dairy have indicated that they too will raise their prices. Some have been raising prices gradually over the last couple of years.

One of the major reasons behind this price rise, according to the Amul official, has been the deficient monsoon that will result in higher commodity prices for raw materials and thus drive up production costs.

There are also other reasons such as fodder scarcity and the damaging, but continuing practice of exporting cattle fodder in India, he said.

“Once milk prices go up, the price for milk-based products like sweets, chocolates, butter, and cheese will also go up. The prices will be further impacted by the upcoming festival season which sees a spike in the demand and consumption of milk-based products especially sweets​ he said.

Milk production in India stood at 112 million tonnes in 2010 and is expected to reach 166 million tonnes by 2011, Indian government predictions have said.

Related news

Show more

2 comments

Export of cattle fodder

Posted by E.R. Vedamuthu,

With agriculture hanging on monsoons year after year, I don't see the rationale in exporting cattle fodder. The first obligation of the government and industry should be to make sure the domestic needs are met before exporting.I also seriously question the need for foreign industry muscling in the dairy sector. They neither serve the producer or the customer. India has enough technical expertise for dairy needs. The co-op industry in the various states have shown that. They should be supported and encouraged instead of Multinationals like Nestles in exploiting the dairy industry.

Report abuse

Milk procurement price in India.

Posted by Pari Valal,

Well the info on above publishing is generalised?! India is the only country in the world which produce almost equal quantity of Buffalo and Cow milk.Price indicated is for Buffalo milk, which literally varies between Rs.22.00 to Rs.42.00 per liter and Cow milk at Rs.17.00 per liter. There is an uneven balance between the government sector societies and well organised private sector on price fixing game, as government always play with the weapon called Subsidy, yet farmers are not happy about the procurement price in comparison with other commodity pricing.

Report abuse