Kerala Co operative Milk Marketing Federation

The Kerala Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (KCMMF) or Milma was registered as a co-operative society in 1980 with its head office in Thiruvananthapuram. It was brought under the Operation Flood programme of the National Dairy Development Board. KCMMF is a Federation of Regional three Regional Milk Unions, the ERCMPU, TRCMPU and MRCMPU. It follows a co-operative structure and one of the most profitable cooperatives in Kerala State. In 1983, it took over (absorbed) the production and milk marketing facilities under the Kerala Livestock and Milk Marketing Board. The board was later renamed to Kerala Livestock Development Board.

A few decades ago, Kerala was seen as a dairy unfriendly State and had to depend primarily on the neighbouring States for its milk supply. However, today, Kerala is almost self-sufficient in milk production. The credit for this largely goes to Kerala Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation and its three Regional Co-operative Milk Producers Unions, for the creation of a procurement and marketing network, introduction of quality products, customer friendly policies, modern management and most important of all the integrated co-operative participation by the farmers. The Statewide network of Dairy co-operatives now operating is doing yeoman service by assuring a steady market and stable price to dairy farmers for the milk produced by them.

Every success story has a humble beginning and so has been with the Kerala Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (KCMMF), popularly known as Milma. Established in 1980 as the implementing agency for Operation Flood II in the State of Kerala, Milma has as its goa.

“The socio-economic progress of the dairy farmer through procuring, processing and marketing of milk”.

The KCMMF operates on the truly democratic lines of “of the farmer, by the farmer and for the farmer”. The Organisation has a three tier structure with the primary milk Co-operative societies at the village level, Regional Milk Producers’ Unions at the middle level and an apex body at the State level which is the Kerala Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd. There are three Regional Co-operative Milk Producers’ Unions operating at present. The revenue districts of Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam, Alappuzha and Pathanamthitta come under the jurisdiction of the Thiruvananthapuram Regional Co-operative Milk Producers’ Union (TRCMPU), the districts of Ernakulam, Thrissur, Kottayam and Idukki under the Ernakulam Regional C0-operative Milk Producers’ Union (ERCMPU) and the six northern districts of Palakkad, Kannur, Malappuram, Kozhikkode, Wayanad and Kasaragod under the Malabar Regional Co-operative Milk Producers” Union (MRCMPU). The three-tier structure ensures that the farmer members are directly responsible for policy level decisions for the marketing of their produce.

The farmer memberships which stood at 45000 during takeover of dairies from the erstwhile Kerala Livestock Development & Milk Marketing Board during 1983 has grown to over 8.0 lakhs through 3100 milk Co-operatives by the end of 2013-14. Similarly, milk procurement has also shown a phenomenal growth from 52,000 litres per day during 1983 to over 10,00,000 litres per day in 2013-14. The success of the marketing network and customer acceptance has been proved by the growth in sales from 55,000 litres per day during 1983 to 12,10,000 litres per day by the end of 2013-14.

Keeping pace with development of milk procurement and sale, milma has concentrated on infra structural development with financial assistance from the National Dairy Development Board, Swiss Development Co-operation and other agencies. As on date, there are 13 milk processing plants with a combined processing capacity of 12.50 lakh litres per day with further expansion envisaged and 8 Milk Chilling Plants scattered across the State. A Milk Powder Plant having a capacity for production of 10 MT of milk powder per day and two cattle feed plants, one at Pattanakkad (300 MTPD) and other at Malampuzha (300 MTPD). The Pellet cattle feed manufactured in these plants are well accepted by the Dairy farmers and in the open market.

The Kerala Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation, in its 34th year of operation, has been one of the successfully run co-operatives of Kerala state. The peoples' strength has been seen time and again in the functioning of our organisation and this has helped us to grow as this was run by the dairy farmers for the dairy farmers. Kerala Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation is a testimony to the success of co-operative development in the hands of the people themselves.