Are we ready for the white revolution? (II)

I was taken aback by the amount of interest shown by readers to my last week’s piece on our readiness for a white revolution in the dairy industry. Much as space might not allow me to publish most of the texts and e-mails I would still go ahead to engage with one or two issues that were raised. One of the discerning readers, Faruk Ingawa, noted that I mentioned Verghese Kurien as the father of the White Revolution in India but did not give much elaboration on how he achieved that. I agree with Faruk that Kurien deserves more than the few words I gave him. Definitely he is today regarded as one of the most outstanding agriculturalist that has ever lived. Also among renown entrepreneurs, his focussed efforts to raise the profile of the dairy industry would probably have no equal.

Kurien was a civil servant that was posted by the Indian Government in 1949 to a creamery in Anand, a city in Gujrat which is a state in Western India. He was sent there to serve out a five-year bond period he signed for when he won a government scholarship. He was not even a core agricultural staff but a mechanical engineer that was reputed to not to like the taste of milk. Somehow he settled down in Anand, even though he was not from those parts. He was from Kerala, in the south-west and his parents were Syrian Christians.

He got himself properly into the scheme of things in Anand and later joined Patel, a visionary community leader trying to unite dairy farmers around Anand to form a corporative movement to fight against exploitation. They were able to form the Kaira District Corporative Milk Producers Union Ltd, which came to be known as Amul. One of the first successes of Amul was the novelty of being able to process skim milk from buffalo milk, an effort which Kurien personally spearheaded. The milk gotten from buffaloes were then more plentiful in India than what cows produced. This was the reason why Amul was able to successfully compete against multinational giants like Nestle and Glaxo that were major milk processing companies and marketers.

Amul cooperative dairy venture succeeded beyond all expectations and as its fame spread, everybody wanted to know something about it. Dignitaries, researchers and trainees and common folks would visit Anand to know more about it. India had just gotten its independence and there was a clamour in the country for self-sufficiency in every sector of the economy. The dairy industry was one of the most visible at the time as the consumption of dairy products was basic to the average Indian diet. Any increase in home production meant a saving in scarce foreign exchange. As Kurien showed signs of success in these endeavours he was massively supported by the government. When Amul was inaugurating its plant India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, came in person to do it. And to endorse Kurien’s ground breaking work and confirm Kurien’s rising profile Nehru embraced publicly during the ceremony.

Amul’s production of condensed milk increased in the 1950s and its market widened giving Kurien the confidence to ask the Indian government to bar the import of condensed milk into the country. It was even said that the then Finance Minister came to trust Kurien’s judgement so much that whenever Kurien would ask him to cut imports of butter it would be done. This was just based on a mere promise by Kurien of an incremental increase of his production to make good any shortage. And every single time he kept his word and the markets never faced any shortage of butter.

Kuriel was so successful in Amul that in 1967, the Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri tasked Kurien to replicate the Amul’s success nationwide. The Indian government specially created the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) and asked Kurien to head it. Kurien agreed but on the conditions that it be independent of government control and that it be set up at Anand, away from the capitals and closer to the farmers. The government readily accepted these conditions.

He set to work immediately to replicate the “Anand pattern” of dairy cooperatives nationwide. He embarked on “Operation Flood” the world largest agricultural dairy development programme which transformed dairy farming in India to its largest self-sustaining industry and the largest rural employment provider with plenty of benefits to the rural communities. In due course it made India the world largest milk producer from a milk deficient nation.

He worked with successive Prime Ministers, Nehru, Shastri, Indira Gandhi, Desai and Ranjiv Gandhi to attract support and succour for the industry over a period of five decades from both the Indian Government and also from International donors all on terms set by him. He was said to be bold and courageous in dealing with donors like UNICEF. Similarly, he was unrelentingly persuasive in his dealings with powerful international lobbies and belligerent government ministers and officials.

This was the kind of spirit I saw when I visited the Kano L&Z farms last week. Here was a dairy farm that had sufficient backward integration with the Fulani herders’ community. Besides that, the L&Z farm was able to attract state and international donor support that all align to uplift the whole community with all year round economic activity. I remember asking M.D. Abubakar, the Chairman of L&Z farms whether what they doing to the herders’ community was part of their corporate responsibility. He said it was more than that. It was a win-win situation for all. The relationship should be considered symbiotic: everything revolves around the cow. When the cow is sedentary, gets adequate pasture and prompt extension service, the herders milk output multiplies to the welfare of all.

May be it is the success of these small-scale outfits that emboldened Governor Umar Ganduje of Kano State to call on pastoralists nationwide that are now the butt of intimidating local laws in some states of the federation, to look towards Kano for salvation. It is obvious that the land is available in Kano plus the willingness to integrate them within the community. Sufficient land is also available in all the neighbouring far-northern states that are home to majority of the herders. These states should take a cue from what is happening in Kano. There is also sufficient interest by the international communities to partner with the states to provide needed infrastructure to accommodate pastoralists among settled communities. With the envisaged improvements in the railway sector the dairy and meat sector should be one of the most attractive ventures in the next few years. It will also require entrepreneurs with the zeal and commitment of the likes of M D Abubakar to bring about the white revolution we envisage in the dairy industry.

From my mailbag:

Your write up made quite an interesting reading especially on the need to integrate herders into a modern non migratory system with value chain for maximum and better yield. Government must provide enabling environment for indigenous investors to thrive as against the current setting of too much attention on “foreign investment”.

Ibrahim Izuagbe