Experts Urge Milk Screening At Farmer Level

Livestock experts have suggested revision of milk quality standards and mandatory screening of milk at the farmer level at least in the organised milk sector to ensure the availability of infection-free and good quality milk for processing and exports.

This would require amendment of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act and laying down of quality parameters for milk by the Bureau of Indian Standards or some other competent body.

These recommendations were made at the recently held symposium on mastitis, one of the six most dreaded diseases of farm animals. The disease causes an estimated annual economic loss of over Rs 6000 crore to the livestock sector.

Veterinarians pointed out that the presence in milk of mastitis causing organisms and residues of antibiotics used to cure this disease constitutes a formidable hurdle in the export of milk and milk products from India. These residues were deemed a grave health hazard, besides marring the processability of milk.

The symposium recommended that a massive awareness programme be launched to highlight the disease menace and promote preventive measures. For this, farmer friendly diagnostic aid for early detection of the infection needs to be popularised.

Milk cooperatives should make it mandatory to screen milk at the field level for bacterial and other residues. This should be part of the cooperative dairy sector