Existing operations of Vidarbha and Marathwada Dairy Development Project (VMDDP) shall also be brought under the ambit of Marathvarhad Milk Producer Organisation in line with NDDB’s application mandate to promote producer owned organisations.

In 2013, the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) and Government of Maharashtra signed an MoU for taking up dairy development in drought prone Vidarbha and Marathwada regions of Maharashtra for creating alternate long-term sustainable livelihood opportunities for farmers of these regions.

It was signed with the objective of diversifying risks of the farmers considering the fact that dairying, being more inclusive livelihood option, has proved to have better salvage value in comparison to agricultural crops in these drought prone and distressed regions.

Mother Dairy, a wholly owned subsidiary of NDDB was tasked with providing market access to the milk produced by the milk producers of ten districts under Vidarbha and Marathwada Dairy Development Project (VMDDP).

The project has been operational since 2016 in ten districts of Akola, Amravati, Wardha, Nagpur, Chandrapur and Buldhana belonging to Vidarbha region and Nanded, Osmanabad, Latur and Jalna belonging to Marathwada region.

Farmers’ confidence and trust in the project is evident through current milk collection of 4 lakh litres on daily basis being procured from about 35,000 dairy farmers of these regions from 2,500 Milk Pooling Points spread across all 10 districts.

As the project has now reached an optimum scale, a new women owned Milk Producer Organisation (MPO) — Marathvarhad Milk Producer Organisation, was incorporated on January 09, 2025 with registered office at Nagpur.

The existing operations of Vidarbha Marathwada Dairy Development Project shall be brought under the ambit of this MPO in line with NDDB’s application mandate to promote producer owned organisations.

NDDB Dairy Services (a wholly owned not for profit subsidiary of NDDB), having experience of facilitating such farmer-owned organisations has been entrusted with the responsibility of providing technical assistance to Marathvarhad MPO.

Mother Dairy shall continue to provide forward linkage for the milk procured by Marathvarhad MPO.

The newly set up women-owned and women-led Marathvarhad MPO aims to cover 6,000 villages of Vidarbha and Marathwada region under organised milk procurement network and enrol 1.85 lakh women dairy farmers as members.

Marathvarhad MPO also plans to set-up automated fair and transparent milk collection system in all the intervention villages. The aim is ensure regular and timely milk payments directly in the bank account of women members.

The Nagpur-headquartered MPO will provide technical input services to farmers at their doorstep in order to increase the milk productivity in the operational area that includes quality feed and fodder production and supply.

Besides, focuse will be on continuous capacity building of Producer Directors, members and other stakeholders associated with entire value chain of the MPO.