College of Dairy Science and Technology (COSDT), Guru Angad Dev Veterinary & Animal Sciences University took an initiative of conducting an intensive five days training programme of value addition to milk and milk products which started from 9th June, 2015. Dr A K Puniya, Dean, CODST revealed that Punjab is one of the leading milk producing state in India with milk production of 9.71 million tones in 2012-13. Out of the total milk production, only 18% of the milk is processed by organized sector (cooperatives and private sectors). Major share of milk still lies with the unorganized sector, where dairying is considered as the secondary source of income after agriculture. Dairy entrepreneurship offers a great deal of promise in this area. It is a need of the hour to shift these small milk producers to milk processors through value addition. Through value addition in milk, small dairy entrepreneurs can make more profit in the range of 15-50%. Small farmers looking for value addition of milk may start small self-help groups with adequate training of technical know-how of product manufacturing. 30 participants including one woman have registered their names for training. The Training programme is being conducted under the able guidance of Dr H K Verma, Director, Extension Education. In his inaugural address to the participants Dr Verma emphasized on the need of value addition to milk and asked them to be innovative and role model by providing quality milk and milk products to the consumer. He urged the participants to excel in the field of value addition and make more profits from such activities. The training programme will cover all aspects of dairy entrepreneurship viz. hand-on-experience of manufacturing different dairy products, quality testing of milk and milk products and marketing aspects of the same. After going through training the farmers would be capable of starting their own enterprise at small scale.
