India can achieve four per cent growth in the agriculture sector, as envisaged in the 12th Five Year Plan, provided the livestock and dairy sectors are given enough incentives, said Mr Mark Kahn, Executive Director of Godrej Agrovet on Monday.

He was participating in a panel discussion on agriculture growth at the Indian Merchants' Chamber.

Mr Kahn said that currently, polices are heavily tilted in favour of dairies run by the cooperative sector. However, cooperative dairies have been successful in Gujarat and to a certain extent in Maharashtra and Karnataka. “But, in the rest of the country it has been an unmitigated disaster. Policy makers should pay attention to private dairies,” he said.

Under the National Dairy Plan, huge sums of money would be handed over to the cooperative dairies, neglecting private sector dairies like Nestle and others. These private dairies are developing the sector very well, as well as undertaking farm extension services, he said.

The National Dairy Development Board has rolled out an ambitious, 15-year-long National Dairy Plan, envisaging an outlay of Rs 17,300 crore.

Private initiative

Mr Kahn pointed that private companies are best suited for developing the sector because they do maximum value addition in milk products, while cooperative sector dairy revenues are still driven by selling milk and they have not diversified their product portfolio.

He said that there was huge potential for growth in the livestock sector, which is almost 25 per cent of the agriculture sector. The sector is already growing at four per cent without any major help from the Centre or the State Governments. The poultry and inland fisheries sectors are also growing at six to eight per cent. There is a need for new investment in these sectors too, he said.

rahulw@thehindu.co.in

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