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Packaged milk powder imported from India, which is used by urban Bhutanese households to make tea and coffee, may not be locally available in the coming days, with the government of India temporarily banning its export.
A notification, issued on February 18 by GoI’s directorate general of foreign trade to manufacturers in India, says, “The export of milk powders (including skimmed milk powder, whole milk powder, dairy whitener and infant milk foods), casein and casein products are prohibited and hence not allowed to be exported till further orders”.
The prohibition was enforced to rein in the rising price of milk in the India, the world’s largest producer of milk, where demand is outstripping supply.
In the past year, retail prices of milk products in India have risen by an estimated 20 percent alone, adding to the high food inflation. India exported milk powder and casein, a derivative of milk, worth Nu 5B last year. Of the 96 M tonnes produced in a year most is consumed in its raw form.
“What is available today in the market is from the old stock but that will soon run out,” an official of the food corporation of Bhutan (FCB), which imports Everyday milk powder from Nestle India ltd, said. “Since the ban came into effect we haven’t received any new stock.”
An estimated 200MT (metric tonnes) of powdered milk is imported by FCB, Tashi Commercial corporation and Damchen agency, the three wholesalers in the country. The bulk of imports is Everyday, the preferred choice among Bhutanese consumers, and a negligible quantity of Amulya and Britannia. FCB alone imports 50 to 60MT a month, which it supplies to a few government institutions and to its agents and retailers. TCC imports an estimated 48MT a month.
FCB officials pointed out that, in the past year and half, the 1kg package of Everyday powdered milk had shrunk to 950g, and now to a 800-g packet, because of the demand, and to control spiralling prices.
The prohibition on export does not extend to milk in its liquid form. This means Amul Taaza in tetra packs will still be available in the market.
FCB officials said that this is not the first time such prohibitions have been issued by the government of India. In 2008, India prohibited the export of non-basmati rice to stabilise prices. The agriculture ministry took it up with the government of India so that Bhutan, which imports 40 percent of its rice needs, was not affected.
Dealers like TCC are hoping that the government will intervene, so that the prohibition does not include Bhutan. “Consumers might have to shift to using liquid milk or other brands of milk powder that is being imported from Thailand,” an FCB official said. “But most consumers are used to the taste of Everyday, so they might have tea or coffee without milk.”
FCB’s deputy managing director, Singye Dukpa, said that a sales representative of the Gujarat co-operative milk marketing federation ltd, which sells milk under ‘Amul’ brand, had told him that cooperatives would not be affected by the prohibition. “So we placed an order for a tonne of Amulya milk powder on a trial basis,” Singye Dukpa said. “But we aren’t sure whether what the representative said is true.”
The Thimphu city milk booth meanwhile sells about a 1,000 litres of fresh milk everyday, supplied by the farmers’ cooperatives in and around the valley.
“The demand for powdered milk is only in the urban areas,” the department of livestock’s dairy division chief, Dr Tashi Dorji, said. “In the villages they have fresh milk.”
According to the departments records the overall demand for milk in 2009 was 40,103MT, of which domestic production was 25,691 tonnes. The rest was imported in liquid and powdered form.
The per capita availability of milk from domestic production was 37kg annually, as against 73kg per capita requirement annually, according to the World Food Programme guidelines.
Dr Tashi Dorji said that the department has a target to increase per-capita milk availability from 37kg to 55kg per annum by the end of the current plan. With the population estimated to be 700,000 by 2013, total domestic milk production should then be 38,500MT.
Source : kuenselonline.com
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