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Hot weather spikes sale of curds in Dakshina Kannada

MANGALURU: The hot weather has brought an unexpected increase in the sale of curd produced by Dakshina Kannada Cooperative Milk Producers’ Union Ltd (DKMUL) and help it achieve record sales.

On April 22, the milk union sold 84,952 kg of curd, bettering its previous mark of 80,900 kg achieved last summer, that is on April 30, 2018.

The hot weather also has had a bearing on the sale of milk which slightly dipped during the month.

Attributing the April 22 record sales to the prevailing hot weather as well as to the consumer’s faith in quality of curd manufactured by the union, G V Hegde, managing director, DKMUL told STOI that the consumer feedback has indicated a higher level of satisfaction among end-users. “The consistency in quality of curds manufactured by us and the fact that it does not sour that quickly has really helped in the offtake of curds in the market,” he said.

Averring that homemade curds do not tend to provide the same kind of quality, Jayadevappa K, manager (marketing), DKMUL said the union is actively educating consumers who buy extra milk to prepare curds at home to instead buy a packet of their curds instead. “Most of our customers have started buying a packet of milk less and are taking home a packet of curd instead. This has boosted sale of curd,” he said.

“Even private players are depending on our curds to prepare end products such as lassi and masala butter milk,” he said. The union that has booth B2B (business to business) and B2C (business to consumers) customers, is benefitting on additional sales. Besides, constant improvement of dealer network is also helpding in the greater offtake of products that have seasonal demand and curd has emerged the winner in this regard, he said.

The demand for curd is not just a summer phenomenon. Sale of curd has grown 10% during the last fiscal as against flat 2% growth for milk during financial year 2018-19. Even nationally, milk sale has grown only 2-3%, he said. “The average daily sale of milk during last fiscal was 3.55-lakh litres,” he said. The highest sale of 4,05,256 litres came on April 16, 2018, on Ramzan. This fiscal, the highest milk sale of 3,76,801 litres was on April 22, he said.

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