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What is the article about?
- The fodder and feed situation in India livestock and poultry sectors.
Relevance:
What is the issue:
- Fodder prices were increasing. The official wholesale price index for fodder in August was 25.5 percent higher than a year ago.
Analysis:
- Wheat and paddy yield not just grain for human consumption. These — and other foodgrain, oilseeds, sugarcane and cotton — are also grown for meeting the fodder and feed needs of livestock and poultry
- Over the last one year, prices of de-oiled bran (a by-product of paddy milling) have doubled to Rs 20 per kg, while going up from Rs 22-23 to Rs 29-30 for rice polish and from Rs 20 to Rs 25/kg for maize. Their price increases — and also of molasses and protein ingredients such as mustard, soyabean and cottonseed oil cakes — have meant that farmers are paying around Rs 23 per kg for cattle-feed, against Rs 17-18 last year. And that’s ultimately getting passed on to consumers.
- Those price pressures should, hopefully, ease in the coming weeks for two reasons:
- The first is the surplus monsoon rains, which should translate into overall improved green fodder availability.
- The second is the start of the kharif marketing season.
- But, there’s a need for some long-term thinking on the livestock sector, which today accounts for about 30 percent of the total income from farming in India.
- Take dairying, where animals are largely fed on crop residues and expensive compound cattle feed. Farmers should, instead, be encouraged to grow high-yielding proteinaceous green fodder that can supply the basic nutritional requirements of their cattle round the year. This will reduce the need for giving costly feed and concentrate mainly when they are producing milk.
Way Forward:
- Fodder crop breeding — both for yields and drought tolerance — has not received adequate attention in India, which is perhaps a reflection of animal husbandry being relegated as a residual/subsidiary activity to “regular” agriculture.
- The current wheat straw and feed shortage should end soon. But policymakers must look beyond the short term. There can be no nutritional security for India without feed security for its livestock and poultry.
