Dairy traders jack up prices

Dairy farmers and retailers of milk have once again unilaterally jacked up the prices of milk and yogurt in Hyderabad. With an increase of Rs20, milk is now being sold at Rs200 per litre and yogurt at Rs280 per kilogramme, up from Rs250.

This is the second raise in prices of dairy products in less than two months. Towards the end of December, 2022, milk price was increased by Rs10 per litre.

Earlier this month, the Cattle Farmers Association and Milk Sellers Welfare Association wrote separate letters to Deputy Commissioner Fuad Ghaffar Soomro on February 2 and 6, respectively, seeking a hike in the prices.

They did not receive a reply in the affirmative as the official rates of milk and yogurt remained the same. Cattle Farmers’ Association President Shaukat Jatoi claimed that the cost of business has been going up along with the overall inflationary trends in the country.

"We were spending Rs700 per day on the feed of a cow until a few months ago. Now that daily cost has gone up to Rs1,100 to Rs1,200 per day," he said. According to him, hundreds of thousands of cattle heads are being fed in Hyderabad at a time when the prices of fodder have become unusually high since last year’s flood.

The milk price has been jacked up by 43% since June 2022. All such attempts are often met by the government’s fleeting action, which lasts for a few days, to control the price and impose fines on the retailers. But this time around action has yet not started.

Kaleem Anwar Memon, who heads the association of the milk retailers, said the hike becomes inevitable after the farmers jacked up the rates. He claimed that until a few days ago they were buying milk from the farms at the rate of Rs170 per litre. But that price has been enhanced to Rs185 per litre.

Cattle colony plots

The auction of two commercial plots, one for cold storage and the other for a small petrol pump, at Hyderabad’s Cattle Colony has been challenged in the Sindh High Court. The Hyderabad Circuit Bench has put the respondents, including the Sindh chief secretary, secretary local government and officers of Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (HMC) on notice.

The petitioner, advocate Ghulam Sarwar, maintained that precious plots worth tens of millions of rupees have been auctioned without following the due approval. He blamed HMC’s Administrator Farooq Khan, Municipal Commissioner Fakhir Shakir and the deputy director Cattle Colony for the auction attempt. He urged the court to order the Sindh government to cancel the auction and take disciplinary action against the HMC’s officers.

The Cattle Colony was set up on Hyderabad-Tando Muhammad Khan Road with the aim of shifting all the unauthorised cattle pens operating in the residential and commercial areas of Hyderabad to one designated area. However, the government’s attempts over more than last one decade have failed to budge the pens existing in the residential parts of the city, Latifabad and Qasimabad. A huge slaughterhouse was also built in the colony but it also remains non-functional.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 25^th, 2023.