Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy virtually launched Andhra Pradesh Amul Project in West Godavari District on Friday.
As per a release by the Chief Minister's Office (CMO), the Amul project, launched in December 2020, supports the livelihood of 13,739 women in the 722 villages of the state. These women farmers have procured over 52.93 lakh litres of milk in 4 districts since the start of the project, and have earned a surplus of Rs 4.06 crores.
Earlier, the Chief Minister, during his 3,648 km Padayatra, saw the plight of the dairy farmers and had said, "The dairy farmers approached me and showed me a litre of milk saying that one litre of mineral water costs more than this milk, this is the situation of dairy farmers now. I then decided that something has to be done about this".
It was then that he came up with the idea of tying up with the 21st-century conglomerate AMUL, under the "Andhra Pradesh Amul Project" as a solution.
Since December 2020, the project has been active in 722 villages, providing livelihood with substantial pay to women dairy farmers, the release stated.
Lauding Reddy's decision for a tie-up, Amul Managing Director RS Sodhi said that the state stands 4th nationwide in the production of milk.
Explaining the process of acquiring milk from the farmers, the CMO said, "Amul acquires milk from dairy farmers through Milk Collection Centres. The quality of milk is tested in front of the farmers, and they are provided with a slip on the spot. This slip shows the grade of the milk and how much it will cost. This helps eliminate any discrepancies in payments to the farmers. The milk is collected and stored through the assistance of Bulk Milk Cooling units (BMCU) and Automatic Milk collection units (AMCU)."
The state government has invested a cost of 218.99 crores to place AMCUs at all milk collection centres, and about 1088.89 crores for positioning BMCUs at 9899 villages.
( With inputs from ANI )
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