A 10-day vocational training course on “Dairy Farming” was organized under the aegis of Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) and ICAR-ATARI, Zone-I, Ludhiana at Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK), Amritsar from 13.05.2023 to 24.05.2023 in which 50 farmers/farm women and rural youth from the districts of Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Gurdaspur and Kapurthala participated. The training course was organized under the able guidance of Dr Bikramjit Singh, Associate Director (Training), KVK, Amritsar.
On the very first day, Dr Bikramjit Singh extended a warm welcome to the participants and shared the mandates and working of KVK with them. He highlighted the importance and scope of dairy farming as a subsidiary occupation in agriculture and inspired the trainees to adopt dairy farming for income and employment generation. He also urged the farmers to get maximum benefit of the services provided by the KVK.
Dr Kanwarpal Singh Dhillon, Assistant Professor (Animal Science), KVK, Amritsar acted as course coordinator and imparted detailed knowledge on various topics including breeding, housing, clean milk production, balanced feed formulation, care and management of dairy animals, importance of vaccination and deworming, common diseases of dairy animals and its prevention to run a successful scientific dairy farm both at local or commercial level. The trainees were also made aware of the economics of dairy farming and method of record keeping. Additionally, method demonstrations on “CMT kits for diagnosis of sub-clinical mastitis in dairy animals” and “Detection of common adulterants in milk” were conducted during the training course.
Dr Wariyam Singh, Deputy Director, Punjab Dairy Development Board, Amritsar, interacted with trainees regarding government funded schemes and benefits of insurance of dairy animals.
Dr Puneet Singh, Veterinary Officer, Amritsar, shared information regarding facilities provided by animal husbandry department and available schemes like KCC and NLM for dairy farmers.
Dr Nitika Goel (Associate Professor) and Dr Nitin (Assistant Professor), Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Ludhiana, shared information about value addition of milk and milk products, and marketing strategies for value-added milk products in detail.
Mr Mohit Antil, AGM, NABARD, Amritsar, provided useful information regarding government funded schemes and subsidies available for dairy farmers.
Mr Praveen Kumar (Chief Manager) and S. Sandeep Singh, SBI bank, Amritsar; and Sumit Kumar, Punjab National Bank, interacted with the trainees regarding procedure of bank loans and insurance policy available for the dairy animals.
An exposure visit was arranged to the farm of a progressive dairy farmer Dr Alamjit Singh of village Nagal Pannuan where trainees had a fruitful interaction and gained important tips.
A “pre-knowledge test” was administered to check the knowledge level of trainees about dairy farming and vocational training programme concluded with “post-knowledge test” to know the gain in knowledge level of trainees about dairy farming. A WhatsApp group was also formed to share the latest knowledge regarding dairy farming and animal husbandry.
During closing ceremony, Dr Kanwarpal Singh Dhillon thanked all the participants and motivated them to take up this new venture at new heights in future. Literature on dairy farming was also provided to the trainees.
Read more: https://www.pau.edu/index.php?_act=manageEvent&DO=viewEventDetail&dataE=datae&intID=9122
