A STUDY OF MARKETING STRATEGIES FOR GOWARDHAN MILK IN MAHARASHTRA STATE
Milk is recognized as the most valuable and whole- some food for man, being nutritive as well as a protective food. Throughout the world, there are more than 6 billion consumers of milk and milk products, the majority of them are in developing countries. Over 750 million people live within dairy farming households. World’s dairy farms produced about 720 million tone of milk in 2010.India is the world’s largest producer and consumer of milk. New Zealand and Australia are the world’s three largest exporters of milk and milk products. China, Mexico and Japan are the world’s largest importers of milk and milk products. Milk is a key contributor to improving nutrition and food security particularly in developing countries. Improvements in livestock, dairy technology and milk quality may offer the most promise in reducing poverty and malnutrition in the world. India is a largest milk producer in the world, in the 1968-69 milk production was only 21.2 million tones it increase to 104.8 million tons in 2007-08. This of course must be attributed in great measure to Operation Flood and the historic Co-operative movement. Operation flood was launched in 1970; Operation Flood has helped dairy farmers direct their own development, placing control of the resources they create in their own hands. A National Milk Grid links milk producers throughout India with consumers in over 700 towns and cities, reducing seasonal and regional price variations while ensuring that the producer gets a major share of the consumers’ rupee. The main objectives of ‘Operation Flood’ were to increase the milk production and augment of rural income. India is developing very fast, and the people in India have started living a better life and have started eating better food. From morning to evening, you have milk based products such as milk with breakfast; curd, paneer, butter milk, lassi with lunch; cheese in sandwich or burgers that one has for snacks; and again in the night milk and other milk based products are consumed. If one calculates roughly, all this will account to 30-35 percent of your daily grocery needs.