‘Emerging opportunities beyond liquid milk’
The market for dairy delicacies in India is growing annually by Rs 5,000 crore every year as mechanisation takes root.
The market for this largest and fastest growing segment of Indian dairying is estimated at Rs 50,000 crore. The growth of this sector is impressive at Rs 5,000 crore per year, covering products such as dahi, paneer, gulabjamun, rasogolla and shrikhand.


The dairy industry needs to recognise the importance of indigenous products to sustain its overall growth. Also, enough attention and investments are necessary to raise the status of this product category from a dominantly non-organised to the organised and allow it to emerge as a mature segment of the industry.
Major market for Indian milk-based sweets is emerging overseas. In North America alone, the market is estimated at $ 500 million. In order to make an enduring presence in the world food market, production of ethnic products has to meet the international standards.

The way forward would be the development of appropriate packaging systems, consistent with the international standards, that will help establish national and international marketing network for mithais. In-depth studies are needed on the biochemical and microbiological changes during storage affecting the product shelf life.

The indigenous dairy products are India’s largest selling and most profitable segment and account for 50 per cent of milk produced. Significant headway has been made in the industrial production of traditional sweets such as shrikhand, gulabjamun, peda and burfi.
India’s dairy market is multi-layered, shaped like a pyramid, with the base made up of the vast market for low-cost, liquid, raw milk. The narrow tip at the top is a small but affluent market, largely for western-type and fresh packaged dairy products.

The expected rise in the purchasing power of growing urban population would give an added boost. New emerging dairy markets would focus on food service institutional market, which is growing at double the rate of consumer market.

Defence market is also important growing market for quality products at reasonable prices. A boom is forecast in the market of dairy products used as raw material in pharmaceutical and allied industries.

The increasing ‘away-from-home’ consumption trend opens new vistas for ready-to-serve dairy products, which would ride piggyback on the fast food revolution sweeping urban India.

PRISE

The Multi fiber Arrangement (MFA) which established quotas on different categories of apparel and textile imports to the US and the European Union, will be fully phased out on January 1, 2005
The Phasing-out of the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing on Apparel Exports on the Developing Countries will have serious implications.
There is need to know Information concerning how different countries and Manufacturers of Apparels are planning to face the challenge, what is the Status of the Industry, Fashion Trends, Markets, what are the developments with regard to Supply Chain Integration, Locating Retailers world wide, finding their Vendor Development Approaches & Policies

From House Wife to Women Entrepreneurs
Shanthi, Tamizhselvi and Sumitha were total strangers to one another. Yet, the other day, just hours after they met for the first time, they were sitting together, like comrades, discussing their plans for the future.

Unknown to them, there were a couple of things in common: They were all entrepreneurs, who worked in reduced circumstances and winners of the Bharat Yuva Shakti Trust (BYST) entrepreneurship awards.

On their own, they decided to launch on a career of entrepreneurship, partly to have something to do and partly to supplement family income.

"I now earn more than my husband, though when I started I made a loss of Rs. 8,000," says Tamizhselvi of Tirunelveli district. Barely 17 years when she was married and just a matriculate, Tamizhselvi moved to Chennai with her husband, looking out for sources of income.

And she ended up incurring a huge loss. "My first venture at starting a business cost me Rs. 8,000. But, struggling to get out of that, I realised I could go nowhere without training. So I got some basic training in the Small Industries Services Institute, Guindy."
From making candles and soaps, taking tips from a well-meaning neighbour, she moved into the garment industry.

"Well, it was not really `industry.' We were making and selling handkerchiefs. Later, we got a Jet Airways contract for making aprons and seat covers. Within two months, we sold 30,000 pieces and other companies seemed interested," says Tamizhselvi.

The change has not been so dramatic for Sumitha, nevertheless she is glad about the way things turned out. At Kancheepuram, she, along with her husband, teaches at a night school for child labourers. During day, she goes to dumping yards, picking up garbage, segregating it and composting bio-waste. She generates at least 50 kg of compost every month. "I get Rs. 2,000-2,500 every month. I make no investment. Everything I make is profit," says Sumitha. Eventually, she hopes to generate more than 5,000 kg of compost.

Shanti, on the other hand, talks of concepts: food scarcity, environment conservation and awareness generation among farmers.

She holds a diploma in agriculture. Propagation of the message of vermicomposting and biomanure is her passion and industry too.

"My entrepreneurship is in the area of service. I do it not only to make some money to keep the family going but also because it is important that someone does these things."

Apart from the three is Rajeswari, who came later on her scooter, taking time off her work.

In May 1995, she started selling printer cartridges, pledging her mother's jewels and borrowing Rs. 20,000 from the BYST.

She built up the business slowly and now leases a factory which makes computer peripherals and has an annual turnover of Rs. 31.75 lakhs.

Rajeswari won the BYST's JRD Tata award for business excellence in 2000 and dreams of importing products from Japan and Singapore.

There is no need to dereserve the manufacture of ice cream.
Howerver, it was felt that it was necessary to clarify that the ice cream reserved for exclusive manufacture for small scale sector did not include frozen desert containing only non-dairy products and manufactured under condition which ensured freezing and storing at temperatures below-11 0C. It was also mentioned that most of the ice cream manufactures in the SSI sector were not frozen upto and below 11 11 0C, the temperature below which shelf life of the ice cream is longer and the bacteria injurious to health, are inactive.