This document summarizes a study of milk consumption habits and practices among smallholder dairy producers in Bihar, India. The study found that while most producers both consume and sell their milk, 15.1% consume raw milk and 38% consume raw milk products. Producers had poor knowledge of food-borne diseases, with only 5.8% aware of brucellosis, leptospirosis or Q-fever. Most producers sold or consumed milk from sick animals. The poor knowledge of food-borne pathogens indicates a need for further understanding risks of milk-borne diseases in Bihar.

1. Milking and milk consumption habits and practices among
smallholder producers in Bihar, India
Introduction
Milk consumption habits and practices of smallholder dairy
producers in Bihar, India, are not well understood. As they get
direct access to farm fresh milk, their consumption habits may be
different from general consumers, who buy milk from market. This
may either be positively or negatively correlated with the risk of
food‐borne zoonoses. Therefore we conducted a study to
understand the milk consumption habits and practices of
smallholder producers.
Ram Pratim Deka1, Johanna Lindahl,2,3Delia Grace,3and Ulf Magnusson2
1 International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), India
2Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Sweden
3 International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), Kenya
Findings and interpretations
• Average milk production 9.1 L/HH; 3.6 L consumed and 15.5 L sold.
Most HH both consume (99.3%) and sell their (87% )milk.
• <1% consume pasteurised milk.
• Milk mostly boiled before consumption (98% of producers)
• Many consume raw milk (15.1%) and raw milk products (38.0%)
• Only 5.8% producers aware of brucellosis, leptospirosis and Q‐fever
• <2.0% farmers knew these could be transmitted to human.
Most sell (64.0%) or consume (62.3%) milk from animals that are
diseased or under treatment. Only 16.8% producers reported that milk
obtained from sick animals were discarded or offered to dogs/calves.
Poor knowledge about food‐borne pathogens might be one of the
reasons behind consumption of raw milk or milk products. In
conclusion, there is a need to further characterize the risks with
milk‐borne diseases in Bihar.
Methods
• Cross‐sectional survey of 3 districts of Bihar, India in autumn 2015.
• In each district, 1 rural and 1urban block was selected.
• From each block, 38‐44 households: in total, 292 HH.
• All selected HH interviewed using a structured questionnaire
• Evaluated by using descriptive statistics.
Bihar
• One of the poorest and most populous states.
• 8.54 million adult dairy animals 41% is buffalo
• About 90% dairy farmers are smallholders
• Dairy sector is growing @ 4.18% per annum
• Farm hygiene is poor
• Little or no effort to improve knowledge and
capacity of value chain actors towards hygienic
milk production, handling, marketing &
consumption
Ram Pratim Deka
International Livestock Research Institute , Jayanagar Road, Six Mile, Khanapara, Guwahati,
Assam, India, PIN 781022 www.ilri.org
Email: R.deka@cgiar.org , Phone: +91 94355 47126
This document is licensed for use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence.
June 2016