Sadhana – a successful dairy entrepreneur
Sadhana lives in a remote village named Maloni Pawar, 46km away from Dholpur, Rajasthan. She is an active member of an SHG in her village. Before joining the SHG, her family was in a tough financial position. They had borrowed from money lenders for agriculture and were paying exorbitant interest rates to repay their debts.
After joining the SHG, Sadhana took a loan to purchase a buffalo and started selling milk to the local milkman at Rs. 30 per litre. Although this was much lower than the market price, she compromised for the lack of a better alternative. During a federation meeting, Sadhana found out about Manjari’s HRDP Parivartan Project, and visited a Dairy Processing Unit in the nearby village Saipau. She saw how women were making paneer, khoa and many other products, and managing the entire operations by themselves. They were also able to get a much better price for their milk (based on fat and CLR content) as compared to what the milkman was offering her.
Sadhana took the lead with her SHG to start their own Milk Poring Institution (MPI) ‘Naari Shikha Dugdh Utpadak Samiti’ and started collecting 185 -200 litters of milk from 26 farmers of her village through Apani Saheli Producer Company.
Impact of her efforts
• Sadhana and other women farmers are getting 5-6 rupees more per litre of milk they sell
• As an entrepreneur, she is getting an MPI running commission Rs. 3000-3500/Month.
• She has successfully repaid her loan from the SHG and also cleared all her debts with the money lender
