July 6, 2010

India's Banas Dairy to set up skimmed milk powder plant
 
 
North Gujarat based Banaskantha District Co-operative Milk Producers Union Limited, popularly known as Banas Dairy, is planning to house a fully-automatic skimmed milk powder (SMP) manufacturing plant at Palanpur.

The proposed plant for which the dairy will invest INR125 crore (US$27 million) will be the second such milk powder plant in the country that will have daily capacity to manufacture 100 tonnes SMP.

At present, Gandhinagar-based Mother Dairy, a unit of Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF) that markets the brand Amul, has the distinction of running the only plant in the country that has capacity of manufacturing 100 tonnes of SMP per day.

"Now, we will be setting up country's second such plant at our dairy," said Banas Dairy's chairman Parthi Bhatol, who also heads GCMMF, adding that once the proposed milk powder plant starts at Palanpur, the dairy's total capacity to produce SMP will be over 200 tonnes per day. At present, combined manufacturing capacity of all dairies of Gujarat put together is 600 tonnes of SMP per day.

"We have received all approvals to set up this plant. The National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) will handle this project on a turn-key basis. While construction of this plant will start soon, we are expecting this plant to become operational next year," said Bhatol.