Mjölkprodukt. o sysselsättn Bangladesh (PRAN-Tetra)

Under the 1st component, the project ensured successful establishment and operation of three new dairy hubs (3, 4, 5) with all village milk collection centers and also contributed in upgradation of the first two dairy hubs (1 and 2) which were already in operation by PRAN before the project has started. During the implementation period, over 60 new village milk collection centers were established in the project area in north-western Bangladesh. Each collection center was equipped with cooling tanks and equipment for milk testing including digital fat testing facilities was installed. Extension and technical services were offered to around 13,000 farmers who have been registered for milk delivery to the collection centres. Sixty new collection centers along with old 40 centres are fully operational though the new 60 were running with low operating capacity during the project period. Considering selling milk and fat-based individual payment, farmers were found happy for the opportunity they have received in their own localities. Under the 2nd component, the project ensured successful operation of the Dairy Academy in terms of providing trainings and supplying skilled staffs for the dairy hub activities. Though PRAN has been operating this Dairy Academy since 2011 much before the project started, however with Sweden support, the Academy has continued its training activities by upgrading curricula and conducted farmers training activities using up to date training materials and techniques in the neighbor-hood of the village milk collection centres. The upgraded training modules includes gender and environmental aspects and produced in local language. The dairy academy was equipped with essential training tools such as milking machines, AI instruments, demonstration farms and fodder for making the training effective. The Project Completion report shows a total of 1137 learners graduated including all staff of the dairy hubs have received trainings on 16-modules on dairy subjects under three separate time periods e.g. 1 month, 3 months and 3 days. All Hubs staffs have also received refreshers training from the senior Dairy Hubs staffs. Under the 3rd component, to improve knowledge of farmers and extension service providers on milk production knowledge, dairy practices and income, the project completion report shows following achievement results:• 13,197 farmers are registered with dairy hubs where 903 are female farmers. Detail information on the farmers registration is shown below in table 1:  • Knowledge of 20,761 farmers with 23 % female and 44 extension service providers improved through imparting trainings on high quality milk production, modern farming techniques, model farms and extension services. • All milk collected from 13,197 registered farmers is measured and tested against fat content, somatic cells, and total bacterial count as a daily routine content at hub level and bacteria at processing centres level. • The report also shows income increased from base year until end of 2017 for Hub 1 is 162%, for Hub 2, 96%, for Hub 3, 78%, Hub 4, 79% and Hub 5, 55% against the base lines for Hub 1 and 2 and for hub 3-5 were 2011 and 2015 respectively. Net average income (USD) during hub life cycle is shown below in Table 2: • In total 295 bio gas plants have been established in the hub areas during the project period and at least 13% of trained farmer adopted fodder farming related production techniques. In summary, project has been able to achieve most of its expected results excepting the 4th component which was assessment of farmers’ need for and access to financial services and improved access to finance for project beneficiaries. This component was dropped at a later stage due to shortage of fund caused by exchange rate drop.

The overarching development objective of the project is to offer an opportunity for small holder farmers and their families to stay in rural areas with improved incomes and living conditions. The overall goal of the project is to improve the livelihood of smallholder dairy farmers in Bangladesh through increased quality and yield of milk, allowing the replacement of imported powdered milk and meeting growing consumer demand.’ Through the establishment and development of the Dairy Academy and three new dairy hubs in Bangladesh, which aimed to improve 8,000-10,000 small holder dairy farmers’ milk production knowledge, dairy practices and income during the project period and onwards. Through knowledge transfer and introduction of proven production methods, the project also aimed to lift the farmers out of poverty. To achieve the expected outputs and impact, the project implemented three major components, closely linked to each other:1) Investment in and operation of three new dairy hubs 3 and optimization of the performance of the first two dairy hubs already in operation.2) Development of the operation of and trainings provided by the Diary Academy 3) Training of farmers, and experts in the PRAN Dairy Academy (DA) at the facilities of the dairy hubs and in villages and at the various small dairy farms covered by the dairy hubsThe fourth component was Assessment of farmers’ need for and access to financial services and improved access to finance for project beneficiaries for farm investments (cow sheds, cows, milking equipment, bio gas plants etc). However, the component was dropped at a later stage due to shortage of fund (caused by exchange rate drop).