GIZ/INCLUDE and the Chitwan District Milk Producers’ Cooperative Union (DMPCU) conducted seven interaction programmes in the VDCs of Bhandara, Parsa, Jivandhara, Patiyani, Yagyapuri and Chanauli of Chitwan district in November and December 2009. The programmes saw about 380 lead dairy farmers interacting with representatives from service providers, dairy industries and financial institutions.

The interaction programmes were mainly aimed at boosting confidence of farmers on dairy farming as a sustainable occupation. The last decade saw a drastic fall in dairy farming primarily due to lack of market for milk and dairy products. Farmers faced bouts of milk holidays and sharp increase in price of animal feed in that period. This caused huge displacement of dairy farmers from their occupation. Now the situation has changed; many big private sector diary companies been established; which have created big market for raw milk. However, these new industries are now being compelled to run under-capacity in unavailability of raw milk. The overall current milk production of Chitwan district is estimated 30 to 35 percent lower that of five years back.

Various issues were identified as being vital for the development of the dairy sector. One of the major issues raised was lack of access to finance that catered to the need of the small farmers. The other areas of demand were technical training on cattle shed construction and management; facilitation on supply of high quality cattle; improvement of animal health services; techniques of reducing production cost and techniques of quality maintenance. They also emphasised that Chitwan District Milk Producers’ Cooperative Union played its role on ensuring market for raw milk, imparting technology for quality control and product diversification.