Project to boost milk production

Thiruvananthapuram: Kudumbashree Mission has announced a project christened 'Pashu Sakhi' to promote animal husbandry as an entrepreneurship option for the women in Kerala. The project, which secured state government approval, will create job opportunities for women in the field of production and marketing of milk, meat and eggs and thus also tackle milk shortage in Kerala, said an official release issued here on Tuesday.
Experts will train 250 women, who will work as community resource persons, the release said.Activities under the new project will be similar to that of 'Master Farmers', a Kudumbashree's initiative in the group farming sector.
The task before the community resource persons would be to aid aspiring entrepreneurs in the animal husbandry sector. They will lead training programmes and preserve data besides ensuring the services of veterinary doctors and agricultural experts.
The project, which would also focus on marketing of products, will ensure the support of other departments for a speedy and effective implementation of the scheme.
It would also enable expansion of existing 'Ksheerasagaram-Nature fresh' scheme under Kudumbashree to more grama panchayats, thus making it the 'best model' to solve the milk shortage problem in Kerala, the release said.