Economic analysis of dairy production among small and medium scale farmers in Karnataka: A case study of Bengaluru district

Abstract

A study on dairy production and processing by small and medium scale farmers was conducted in Bengaluru north. The survey showed that dairy production is characterized by low milk production as a result of the use of indigenous/local breeds of dairy cattle managed under pastoral production system. As influenced by urbanization there have been changes in the herd size around Bengaluru north. As agricultural lands pave way for non-farming uses, the land available for growing green fodder exclusively for dairy units which are relatively smaller in size with 2–5 animals per farmer, is shrinking. Even the cost of producing dairy products like milk varies from urban to rural areas. It is observed that the proportion of small dairy farmers was highest in all the three regions, viz. urban (72%), rural (63%) and transition (55%) areas of the Bengaluru north. This reveals that dairy was one of the major sources of livelihood for small farmers in the study area. Cost of labour was highest for all the groups of the dairy farmers in all the three regions followed by the cost of concentrates. The net revenue realized by all the three types of dairy units varied positively with herd size of the dairy farm. Thus, large sized dairy units availed the benefit of scale economies as income per cow was highest at ₹ 22,267, ₹ 23,837 and ₹ 24,870 in rural, transition and urban areas respectively. The net returns were found highest in crossbred cow followed by buffalo and local cow in all the three gradients of the study region.