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Dairy Industry Status in Tanzania 2011
Dairy Industry Status in Tanzania 2011
Dairy Industry Status in Tanzania 2011
By Mrs. A.P. Njombe, Dr. Yakobo Msanga, Mr. Nathaniel Mbwambo and Mr. Nemes Makembe
Department of Animal Production, Livestock Products and Marketing Infrastructure
Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries Development, Temeke Veterinary/Mandela Road, P.O. Box
9152, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
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Paper Presented to the 7th African Dairy Conference and Exhibition held at
MovenPick Palm Hotel, Dar es Salaam, 25 – 27 May 2011
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Contents
ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................................................................... ii
1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 1
4.1 A large cattle herd and size of grazing land & Pasture resources; ..................................... 11
5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................. 13
References..................................................................................................................................................... 14
ANNEXES ......................................................................................................................................................... 15
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ABSTRACT
The dairy industry is among the important components of the livestock sector. It contributes
about one-third of the 4.6% livestock industry’s contribution to the Gross Domestic Product
(GDP). The industry has even greater potential for improving the living standards of people
through improved nutrition arising from milk consumption and incomes raised from sales of milk
and milk products.
Out of the 21 million cattle in Tanzania, about 680,000 are dairy cattle mainly crosses of Friesian,
Jersey, and Ayrshire breeds with the Tanzania Shorthorn Zebu (TSZ). Total annual milk
production is currently estimated at 1.65 billion litres. About 70% of the milk produced comes
from the traditional sector (indigenous cattle) kept in rural areas, while the remaining 30% comes
from improved cattle mainly kept by smallholder producers. Currently, the total milk processing
capacity is about 384,100 litres per day, however the actual processed amount is about 105,000
litres per day. To date, per capita milk consumption in the country is estimated at 43 litres. This
consumption level is relatively low compared to the recommended milk per capita milk
consumption of 200 litres by FAO.
The paper dwells with policies, strategies and programs that are being implemented by the
government and stakeholders in order to commercialise the industry. The paper also covers the
production status, milk processing, marketing and consumption with respect to challenges that
face every stage of the value chain. On production status it includes the animals that produce
milk, their distribution and actual seasonal variations in milk production. On milk processing the
amount of milk processed compared to amount available and the possibilities of expansion are
dealt with. Milk marketing and consumption are interrelated factors in the value chain as increase
of consumption expands the domestic market thus stimulating production.
Existing opportunities and prospects in the dairy industry are also indicated.
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THE TANZANIA DAIRY INDUSTRY: STATUS, OPPORTUNITIES AND PROSPECTS
1 Introduction
Tanzania has abundant natural resources which include land and a large livestock
resources base. It covers an area of 94.5 million ha of which 88.6 million ha is a land
mass and 6.2 million ha is covered by water. Out of the 88.6 million ha of land, 60 million
ha are rangelands with a capacity to carry up to 20 million livestock units and provide
over 90% of the feed resource to the livestock. However, due to some constraints such
as tse tse fly infestation and other uses only 40% of the rangelands are utilized for
grazing 21.3 million cattle, 15.2 goats and 6.4 sheep. Other major livestock species kept
in the country include 1.6 million pigs and 43 million chickens. More than 90% of the
livestock population in the country is of indigenous types, kept in the traditional sector,
known for their ability to survive and produce even under harsh environment with poor
feed resources and disease challenge.
Livestock is among the major agricultural sub-sectors in Tanzania. Out of the 4.9 million
agricultural households about 36% are keeping livestock of whom 35% are engaged in
both crop and livestock production. The sector grew at 3.4% and contributed about 3.8%
to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (Economic Survey, 2010) of which 40% came from
beef, 30% from dairy and the remaining 30% from other livestock commodities.
Similarly, the dairy industry is among the important components of the livestock sector. It
is a source of animal protein, income and employment. The sector has a great potential
for improving the living standards of the people and contributing towards reduction of
poverty through improved nutrition, arising from consumption of milk and incomes raised
from sale of milk and milk products.
The main dairy animal in Tanzania is cattle which are classified as dairy for those that
average about 2000 litres per lactation and dual purpose indigenous cattle producing
around 300 - 500 litres and are mostly used for beef which are the majority. The dairy
cattle are kept by smallholders’ farmers and few medium and large scale farms. The
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indigenous cattle are kept by traditional livestock keepers in the pastoral and
agropastoral systems.
The performance of the dairy industry has been influenced by changes in economic
policies and regulations which have affected harnessing of resources. Currently strategies
and programmes have been formulated in order to modernise the industry. Development
of the dairy industry has concentrated mainly on increasing the number of improved
animals for milk production, improving production, processing and marketing systems.
It is the objective of this paper is to give an overview of the status of the dairy industry in
Tanzania indicating performance of the industry, opportunities, potentials and prospect
for further development of the industry.
The dairy industry in Tanzania has gone through various stages of development. Pre and
after independence, dairying was practiced mainly in areas which had a conducive climate
to enable production of sufficient milk and that had a potential market for milk such as
Kilimanjaro, Arusha and Dar es salaam. In the rest of the country milk produced was
consumed within the rural areas.
In areas with surplus milk to warrant establishment of a dairy plant, Zonal Dairy Boards
were established to regulate and develop the industry. After independence regulation of
the industry was done through a Dairy Industry Ordinance No. 61 (Cap 456) which was
then replaced by a Dairy Act of 1965 that established a Government Controlled National
Dairy Board (NDB). The board became moribund in 1973 as the then Minister of
Agriculture did not appoint new members to the Board.
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were investments in the establishment of parastatal medium and large scale dairy farms,
livestock multiplication units, milk processing plants and milk marketing infrastructures.
These initiatives resulted in the establishment of 8 dairy farms under the Dairy Farming
Company (DAFCO), 7 milk processing plants under the Tanzania Dairies Limited
producing reconstituted milk using powered skimmed milk and butter oil which were
supplied by the World Food Programme. Proceeds from sale of the reconstituted milk
were used for development of the Dairy Industry.
From mid 1980’s the approach for development of the dairy industry shifted from
establishment of medium and large scale farms towards small holder dairy development.
This shift was prompted by the underperformance of parastatal dairy enterprises
associated with management problems as they proved to be more efficient and as a
strategy for poverty reduction. The change in strategy towards dairy development
coincided with economic reforms which included government withdrawal from performing
production, marketing and processing and other business related functions and
liberazation of markets among others.
As a result of this reforms many individuals and agencies joined the industry as milk
producers, processors, marketing agents and facilitating agencies performing various
functions such as promotion of improved dairy breed, milk processing and marketing but
without a proper primary regulator. This led to inadequate control of the industry. To
rectify this anomaly the government enacted a Dairy Industry Act No. 8 of 2004 providing
for the establishment of the Tanzania Dairy Board, which was inaugurated in 2006 with a
mandate to develop and regulate the industry. The Board draws its membership from the
Government and stakeholder organizations such as Milk producers, Milk Processors, milk
traders, input suppliers and consumers.
The Dairy industry in Tanzania is still young but developing. Current Development
strategies aim at modernizing it commercializing the industry and making it competitive.
Production of milk is mainly from indigenous cattle followed by improved dairy cattle and
dairy goats and the production is mostly for the domestic market, which mainly prefers it
to be in raw and only little amount in processed form.
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3.1 Milk Production
Out of the 21.3 million cattle in Tanzania, about 680,000 are dairy cattle mainly crossbred
of Friesian, Jersey, Ayrshire breeds with the Tanzania Shorthorn Zebu (TSHZ). Total
annual milk production has increased from 814 million litres in 2000/01 to 1.65 billion
litres in 2009/10 (Table No. 2). Most of the milk produced in the country comes from the
traditional sector (indigenous cattle, about 70%) kept in rural areas, and the remaining
come from improved cattle mainly kept by smallholder producers. The increase in milk
production from both indigenous and improved dairy cattle is due to increase in herd size
rather than in productivity per head (milking cow). Currently, only a small proportion
(10%) of marketable surplus of milk produced annually is filtering through, into the urban
markets and processing plants. A large proportion of milk is consumed at home or wasted
in the rural, milk producing areas. The potential for increased milk supply from rural
areas still exists. To exploit it requires improved infrastructures such as milk collection
centres, power supply, roads network and transport facilities.
Milk production in Tanzania is carried out under two major production systems. These are
the traditional and the dairy production systems. Within the traditional system milk is
mainly produced by indigenous cattle which are kept for multipurpose objectives. The
indigenous cattle which constitute the traditional herd are mainly kept in the Central,
Northern and Western parts of the country (Table No. 1). The traditional system is
characterised by low productivity, but high per unit of invested money. In addition
production costs are relatively low. Due to the remoteness and poor infrastructure,
collection of milk and marketing constitute the largest bottlenecks. Hence, the milk
produced is mostly consumed locally and quite often a significant amount is left for the
calves because of the lack of markets. However, some producers who depend on milk for
their cash income are willing to exploit the available opportunity in marketing their
produce, for example, some traditional producers residing mainly in peri urban areas near
towns or urban centers such as those in the Coast region, transport milk by bicycles over
long distances, for sale either at some collection centres located along the major road
highways eg. Morogoro road. In this system cattle owners bring lactating cattle from the
rangelands (in remote areas) to areas closer to the road side.
Within the dairy systems, improved dairy cattle which are mainly crosses of Friesian,
Jersey and Ayrshire to the Tanzania Shorthorn Zebu (TSHZ) are the main dairy cattle
breeds in use. These systems are further subdivided into smallholder dairy systems
integrated with crops, urban/peri-urban dairy systems and specialized medium and large-
scale dairy system.
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Table No. 1: Population of Cattle by Zone
Generally in Tanzania smallholder dairy farms are relatively small in size having 1 – 5
cows per household under Zero grazing and are normally found in diverse climatic
conditions. The system is either integrated with perennial crops (banana and coffee) or
with annual crops. The system which is integrated with perennial crops enjoys reasonably
good climatic conditions suitable even for pure dairy breeds. This system is commonly
practised in the Southern Highlands, Northern highlands and Kagera Region. The
smallholder dairy system is gradually expanding in the sub humid coastal and sub urban
areas (such as Tanga, Morogoro and Coast regions).
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In the specialized Medium Scale dairy farming system, milk production is the main
economic activity of the farm. The farm comprises of 10-50 cows and the management
is mainly paddock grazing rather than zero grazing. Medium scale dairy farms are found
near big urban centers such as Dar es Salaam, Tanga, Morogoro, Iringa and Arusha.
Large Scale State dairy farms are farms with 50 or more dairy cows. There are a number
of such farms (some of them are shown in Annex 1), with a total of about 32,100 dairy
cattle. In the past most of these farms were government owned farms. In addition a few
privately owned large-scale farms exist, particularly in Iringa, Morogoro, Tanga,
Kilimanjaro and Arusha regions.
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Table:2: Production of milk (‘000’) 2000/01 - 2009/10
YEAR
Type of
cattle 2000/01 2001/02 2002/03 2003/04 2004/05 2005/06 2006/07 2007/08 2008/09 2009/10
Indigenous 514,000 578,000 620,700 813,700 920,000 941,815 945,524 980,000 1,012,436 997,261
Improved 300,000 322,500 359,800 366,300 466,400 470,971 475,681 520,000 591,690 652,596
Total 814,000 900,500 980,500 1,180,000 1,386,400 1,412,786 1,421,205 1,500,000 1,604,126 1,649,857
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Chart No. 1: Production of milk (‘000’) 2000/01 - 2009/10
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3.2 Milk Collection, Processing and Marketing
Milk collection is practiced in areas with surplus milk above the local market requirement
which are connected to markets in peri and urban areas. Existing collection centers are
operated through farmer’s groups, processors or few traders who collect and sell to
processors or consumers. Seasonal availability of milk which is acute in the traditional
sector discourage establishment of collection centers and processing plants. Milk
collection for processing will only be feasible if there is surplus production and a well
established collection system which entails bulking and transportation. As it has been
indicated earlier in this paper, milk is mainly produced by indigenous cattle which are
widely distributed in different areas including remote villages whereby the road
infrastructure is poor and having inadequate provision of utilities such electricity. These
problems contribute to inefficiency in milk collection and addition of cost for milk
collection and processing.
A few dairy producer societies exist in Tanzania they are mainly found in Tanga region
(where 13 societies with 3,004 members exist). Non existence of producer societies not
only makes collection and marketing of raw milk difficult but also discourage introduction
of innovations. All these challenges result into limited domestic and export marketing of
milk and milk products. Establishment of a well coordinated milk collection network could
be a kick start towards successful milk processing and marketing.
Milk processing in the country is mainly undertaken by small and medium scale plants of
capacities ranging between 500 and 30,000 liters per day. The current national milk
processing capacity is 410,500 liters per day, but, the capacity utilization is about 30%
(Annex 2). The low capacity utilization is partly due to inadequate raw milk production as
a result of seasonality in milk production due to inadequate feeding; milk being produced
in small quantities and milk producers being widely spread in remote areas thus
increasing milk collection and transportation costs; high cost of milk processing due to
high cost of equipment, machinery, packaging materials and utilities. In addition to the
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poor infrastructure, high cost of doing business and low milk consumption levels also
constrain milk processing.
Products processed from these plants include pasteurised milk, fermented milk, cheese,
yoghurt, ghee and butter. Among the efforts to create a conducive environment for
development of the dairy industry, the government has exempted import duties for milk
packaging materials, some equipment used in the collection, transportation and
processing of milk products. Furthermore, the Local Government Authorities are
sensitizing the stakeholders to form groups, associations and cooperative societies in
order to enhance milk collection, handling and processing.
It is estimated that 41 million litres of milk is annually processed in the country into
pasteurised milk, UHT, cultured, ghee, butter, cheese and cream and sold in the domestic
market. Milk is also imported in the country whereby reports indicates in the year 2008
about 26.14 million litres of milk equivalent which accounted for 48% of processed milk
products were imported in the country, thus posing competition between local and
imported milk products. There is therefore a challenge to produce milk products of high
quality bearing cost effectiveness in mind so as to increase competitiveness of the dairy
industry in Tanzania and in the region.
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Milk produced in the country is consumed among urban populations but is mainly
consumed in the livestock keeping communities where a person can consume more than
100 litres per annum (Milk Production and Processing in Central Regions of Tanzania,
RLDC, 2009). It is acknowledged that the domestic market is relatively narrow compared
to the existing human population. There have been initiatives to expand and develop a
sustainable domestic market for milk and milk products and (thereby encourage
investment in milk processing). Such initiatives include conducting of generic milk
promotion campaigns through Milk Consumption Promotion Week which is conducted
every end of May and beginning of June since 1998. In addition to that, School Milk
Feeding Programmes are implemented in 91 schools in four districts which involve 62,900
school children (Annex 3). Through such initiatives per capita milk consumption has
increased from 25 litres in 2000 to 43 litres in 2010. Efforts to scale up SMFP have been
taken by preparing a SMFP which if implemented would increase the number of school
children that would benefit from the initiative. Increase in milk consumption levels will
have a catalytic effect in improving levels of milk production, processing and development
of the dairy industry in general.
4.1 A large cattle herd and size of grazing land & Pasture resources;
As stated earlier in this paper the country has a large number of cattle, grazing land &
pasture resources. This provides a great opportunity for increasing milk production from
the indigenous cattle by increasing the number of grade cattle which at the moment are
few (680,000). In order to produce relatively more milk, a total of 3 million dairy cattle
would be required. The availability of AI services could enable this target be achievable.
Dairy production in Tanzania is mainly under small scale farms which have proved to be
vulnerable to seasonal variations in feed supply; however the variation is less in medium
and large scale farms. Promotion of the establishment of medium to large scale farms is
therefore necessary for the purpose of producing large quantities of milk in one locality
thus realizing economies of scale, minimizing seasonal variations, milk collection and
transportation related problems and thereby promoting processing of milk.
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4.2 Potential domestic and export markets;
Tanzania has a big potential domestic market. It has an estimated human population of
over 42.8 million people, a growing economy and an emerging middle class with
relatively high disposable income. With these potentials the country provides a big
domestic market. Added to this is the regional market. Currently, these potentials are not
fully utilised. Expansion of the internal market for milk and milk products is very
important. This is because a reliable market is the driving force for the dairy industry
growth.
This could be achieved through establishing and deploying quality assurance systems
along the value chain. Other strategies to expand the domestic milk market include
conducting of rigorous marketing and promotion campaigns through milk promotion week
which is currently done as well as expansion of the school milk programmes.
Expansion of milk processing capacity and range of dairy products produced in Tanzania
as a strategy is also important. Expansion of production of UHT and other milk products
can cut down importation of the same and reduce substantially annual import bill spent
on such products. It is also important to increase milk processing capacity from the
current 30% to at least 75% in order to increase profitability of the milk processing
plants.
Strengthening of the Tanzania Dairy Board is important in order to organise and promote
the development of dairy stakeholder’s organisation at all levels and the industry at large.
Strengthening of stakeholder’s organisations could be achieved through registration,
formalisation of informal dairy stakeholders and through information, education and
communication campaigns, training and skills enhancement. The expected benefits from
the well organised and managed grassroots organisation would improve their access to
production, marketing and financial services among others.
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5 Conclusion
The dairy industry in Tanzania is developing with prospects for expansions making a
bigger contribution to the Gross Domestic Product and improving the welfare of the
people. Milk production is low due to the small number of dairy animals, undeveloped
systems of production and the low effective demand of dairy products. These can be
overcome by harnessing the great potentials available by upgrading the indigenous stock,
developing large scale farms and having an effective extension system for the smallholder
farmers. Coupled with this is investment in processing and creating effective demand by
promoting consumption.
Current Development strategies that aim at modernizing the dairy sector should be
geared towards setting a process that will move the sector from subsistence to
commercialization thereby making it competitive. Future development of the dairy
industry should stress on sustainable production systems of high productivity conducted
on commercial basis in order to improve the livelihoods, employment, availability of raw
materials and contribute more significantly to the national income and conservation of the
environment.
At present there is a good legal system to regulate the industry and an economic
environment to guarantee investors of their investments. Deliberate investment efforts
are required on input supply and service provision, production, collection, processing and
marketing in the dairy industry could improve the performance and hence increase its
contribution to the national economy.
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References
1. AustroProject Association, 2009 In: Milk Production and Processing in the Central
Regions of Tanzania.
3. Kurwijila R.L, N. Mdoe, D.N. Nyange, R.M. Auerbock and U.N. Malya, 1995 In:
Assessment of Fresh Milk and Milk Products Market and Consumption in Dar es
Salaam, The Austro Project Association.
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ANNEXES
Kitulo 1, 2 860
Total 12,707
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Annex 2 - Milk Processing Plants and Capacities in Tanzania
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S/N Region Processing Plants Capacit Status Current %
y (litres Production Capacity
per day) (litres per Utilisation
day)
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S/N Region Processing Plants Capacit Status Current %
y (litres Production Capacity
per day) (litres per Utilisation
day)
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S/N Region Processing Plants Capacit Status Current %
y (litres Production Capacity
per day) (litres per Utilisation
day)
Total of 62 Plants
Total 91 62,500
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