DIDF - Dairy Processing & Infrastructure Development Fund

To ensure that Dairy Cooperatives remain competitive for the sustained benefit of farmers, the Government of India had announced creation of Dairy Processing and Infrastructure Development Fund under NABARD with a total corpus of Rs. 8000 crore over a period of 3 years (i.e. 2017-18 to 2019-20), in the Union Budget of 2017-18.

Funding will be in the form of interest bearing loan, which will flow from National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) to National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) / National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) and in turn to eligible End Borrowers.

Objectives of the scheme

The scheme have been designed with the following objectives:

1. To modernize the milk processing plants and machinery and to create additional infrastructure for processing more milk.
2. To create additional milk processing capacity for increased value addition by producing more dairy products.
3. To bring efficiency in dairy processing plants/producer owned and controlled dairy institutions, thereby enabling optimum value of milk to milk producer farmers and supply of quality milk to consumers.
4. To help the producer owned and controlled institutions to increase their share of milk, thereby providing greater opportunities of ownership, management and market access to rural milk producers in the organized milk market.
5. To help the producer owned and controlled institutions to consolidate their position as dominant player in the organised liquid milk market and to make increased price realisation to milk producers.

Scheme Area

The scheme will be implemented across the country.

Components of the scheme

The components of the scheme are as under:

1. Modernization & creation of new milk processing facilities
2. Manufacturing facilities for Value added Products
3. Milk Chilling infrastructure
4. Setting up electronic milk testing equipment
5. Project Management and Learning
6. Any other activity related to the dairy sector targeted to contribute to the objectives of DIDF and decided by Government of India in consultation with the stakeholders.

Loan

The End Borrowers of the scheme are Milk Unions, State Dairy Federations, Multi-state Milk Cooperatives, Milk Producer Companies and NDDB subsidiaries meeting the eligibility criteria under the project. The Loan Component would be 80% (maximum) and the end borrower's contribution - 20 % (minimum).

The end borrowers will get the loan @ 6.5% per annum. The period of repayment will be 10 years with initial two years moratorium. The respective State Government will be the guarantor of loan repayment. Also for the project sanctioned if the end user is not able to contribute its share; State Government will contribute the same

Benefits from DIDF

With the scheme investment, 95,00,000 farmers in about 50,000 villages would be benefitted. Additional Milk processing capacity of 126 lakh litre per day, milk drying capacity of 210 MT per day, milk chilling capacity of 140 lakh litre per day, installation of 28000 Bulk Milk Coolers (BMCs) along with electronic milk adulteration testing equipment and value added products manufacturing capacity of 59.78 lakh litre per day of milk equivalent shall be created.

Initially 39 MUs the Department will start the project with 39 profit making milk unions of 12 States, other Milk Cooperatives which become eligible on the basis of their net worth and profit levels, in subsequent years, to apply for loan under DIDF.

Employment Generation Potential

The implementation of DIDF scheme will generate direct and indirect employment opportunities for skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled manpower. Direct employment opportunities for about 40,000 people will be created under the scheme through project activities like expansion & modernisation of existing milk processing facilities, setting up of new processing plants, establishment of manufacturing facilities for value added products and setting up of Bulk Milk Coolers (BMCs) at village level.

About 2 lakh indirect employment opportunities will be created on account of expansion of milk and milk product marketing operations from existing Tier I, II & III to Tier IV, V & VI cities/towns etc. This will lead to deployment of more marketing staff by Milk Cooperatives, appointment of distributors and opening of additional milk booths/retail outlets in urban/rural locations. With the increase in milk procurement operations of the Milk Cooperatives, there would be generation of additional manpower employment for supervision of increased milk procurement operations, transportation of milk from villages to processing units, and increased input delivery services like Artificial Insemination (AI) services, Veterinary Services, etc.

For more information, visit https://www.nddb.org/didf/didf-in-brief

Source : NDDB