by Jims Vincent Capuno
With more than 90 million Filipinos living in the Philippines today, each person gets only about three drops of milk per day. That’s according to Raylin Sanchez of the Federation of Davao Dairy Farmers Cooperative (FDDFC) based in Malagos, Davao City.
“It’s sad but that the situation right now,” she pointed out. “But we are doing our best to change the condition.”
The Philippine dairy industry is considered a vital component of the country’s economic and nutritional development. Although it is rife with promise, not a lot of farmers and companies have milked the most out of its potential. In fact, the milk industry remains undeveloped.
The country has only about 15,000 dairy animals producing milk. The production can only supply a measly one percent of the total needs of the Filipinos. Although there was an increased milk production from 13.81 thousand metric tons in 2008 to 14.27 thousand metric tons in 2009, still it was miniscule compared with those being churned out each day by international producers.
“The Philippines’ annual milk in 2006 was equivalent to half a day’s milk production in India the same year,” pointed out dairy specialist Sally Bulatao in a presentation during the 2008 Asia-Pacific Smallholder Dairy Strategy Workshop.
Bulatao lamented that country’s annual milk production of 13 million liters (or about 36,000 liters per day) that year, “there is hardly an industry to speak of (in terms of production).”
“If we are to compute the national milk requirement based on the recommended dietary allowance of 19 kilograms per year, we would need an average supply of about 2,500 thousand metric tons of 2.5 billion liters each year,” the Philippine Carabao Center (PCC) claimed.
Presently, the country imports 98 percent of its milk and other dairy products requirements. In a recent Dairy Congress and Expo 2010 held in Cebu, it was reported that milk is the country’s top agricultural import worth around US$500 million.
“We pay foreign dairy farmers millions of dollars each year,” the PCC deplored.
Nestlé Philippines, Alaska Milk Corporation, and New Zealand Creamery are the top three importers of milk in the country, according to the National Dairy Authority (NDA), an attached agency of the Department of Agriculture (DA).
According to the NDA, the Philippines has not achieved self-sufficiency in milk because there is not enough investments in dairy and there are not enough animals on the ground to support the huge demand
The Davao-based FDDFC, which is assisted by NDA, is very much aware of this existing problem when it was launched in 1990. Its main objective is “to be the dairy capital of the Philippines, providing better nutrition to Filipinos and livelihood to the dairy farmers.”
Local milk and dairy production is mainly done in the dairy stations in Davao and Cagayan de Oro City in Mindanao, in Cebu City in the Visayas, and in Santa Maria, Bulacan, and Santa Cruz, Laguna, in Luzon, although some dairy farms are maintained by some state-run agricultural schools.
When FDDFC started, there were only four cooperatives as members. In later years, the members surged to 30 cooperatives. From producing only 700 liters of fresh milk a day, it now produces 1,300-1,500 liters each day.
Today, the dairy federation is responsible for producing the Davao Dairy Best fresh and flavored milk. It delivers milk to supermarkets not only in Davao City but also in General Santos City, Agusan del Sur, North Cotabato and South Cotabato.
How did the federation able to increase its milk production? According to Sanchez, they provide loan to interested farmers by providing them three dairy cows. Most of the cattle are heifers and imported from New Zealand. Payment is five years in the form of milk or cash.
The struggling country’s dairy industry relies mostly in local reproduction of the hybrid cattle heads sparsely distributed to the available they could get from the sparse importation to stay afloat.
The FDDFC, however, believes that increasing the dairy herd in southern Mindanao could greatly contribute to the increase in milk production in the region.
The loaned-out cattle are crossbred between Holstein-Friesen and Sahiwal. The temperate Holstein-Friesian has an average daily milk production of 22 kilograms with an average butterfat content of 3.6 percent
Sahiwal, a tropical breed that is more adapted Philippine conditions, has an average daily milk production of eight kilograms with a butterfat content of 4.9 percent.
The cows produce about 8 liters of milk per day (one liter is equivalent to one cup), of which one-and-a-half is deducted as payment to the dairy federation. “We buy milk from our members at P20 per liter,” informed Sanchez. “We process the milk and sell them at P45 for fresh milk and P50 for flavored ones.”
Currently, there are 200 farmers who are members in Davao City alone. The productive life span of each cattle is ten years. “Our dairy federation is the one and only in Southern Mindanao,” Sanchez says.
The dairy federation got help from the Department of Science and Technology (DOST). For one, the staff underwent training on milk processing and pasteurization. The government agency provided designed for the retort machine used in milk processing. “As a result of the design, we were able to spend only P2 million instead of the usual cost of P20 million,” points out Sanchez
Maintenance of the retort machine, which is done every year, is also provided by the DOST.
Milk is the most ideal food, meeting human nutritional needs better than any other single food item. It is rich in most of the nutrients needed by the human body. That is why newly born babies can subsist solely on milk in the first few months of their lives.
