May 6, 2013

Visakha Dairy plant to complete construction by September

A. Tulasi Rao, Chairman of Visakha Dairy plant, which is under construction at Rangampeta in East Godavari district, has announced that the plant will be ready by August-September.

He was speaking to reporters at the Visakha Dairy plant on Sunday (Apr 28) after releasing a new product - 100-millilitre (ml) toned milk in tetra pak at INR5 (US$0.09).

He said the dairy was selling 75,000 litres of high quality milk per day with varying fat content in toned, double toned, skimmed and standard milk variants. The dairy aims at a target of 100,000 litres per day by the end of the year.

The 100-ml Visakha Tetra Pak is aimed at the lower-end consumer, combining the twin features of affordability and single use. The product would be sold in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Orissa.

He said that the plant could process 600,000 litres per day. Visakha Dairy is procuring milk from Srikakulam, Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam and the two Godavari districts.

"We are setting up the Rangampeta processing plant at a cost of INR200 million (US$3.7 million) with a capacity of 250,000- 300,000 litres, as it is becoming increasingly difficult to bring milk all the way from the two Godavari districts. We have to cut down on the transport costs. We tried to acquire the sick Godavari Dairy and turn it around, but the Government was not very keen on it. Therefore, we decided to put up a plant on our own,'' he said.

Rao said that Visakha Dairy is procuring milk from more than 200,000 farmers in the five districts, covering 2,800 villages.

"Our primary objective is to provide quality milk and milk products to consumers and at the same time do justice to our farmers by paying them a remunerative price. Of course, a balance has to be struck between the two aims. We have set up a hospital with excellent facilities here for the sake of the farmers and staff and we also try to provide educational facilities to the children of the farmers,' 'he said.