Dairy industry ‘mooing’ to Aatmanirbharta with indigenous bovine sex-sorting technology

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It’s now Aatmanirbhar in the dairy industry in the form of sex sorting technology for bovine. Field trials of indigenously developed technology on this are underway and the results are expected by August.

At present, there are two technologies — both from the US — through which the sorting happens with samples sold to farmers at around ₹1,000 per sample. However, through the indigenous technology, the cost will be reduced to nearly one-third, and the technology in turn will help in milk production due to higher number of female calves, Meenesh Shah, Chairman, National Dairy Development Board & NDDB Dairy Services, told businessline.

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At present, two US-based companies — ST and ABS — are supplying the sex semen sorting machines. In total artificial insemination, the sex sorted semen is used less than 1 per cent. With this indigenous technology, more female calves will be produced, leading to increased milk production, he said at the Alamadhi Semen Station.

“We started the trial run of the technology from March 2024 at Alamadhi. Till date, 5,000 doses of sex sorted bovine semen have been produced. Post the review of the trial results, the technology can be dedicated to the nation,” Shah said.

“Initial results are good in terms of conception rate and purity. we are getting the desired results, either equal or better than the technologies which are available. If everything goes as planned in two months time, we will be ready to roll out,” he added.

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“It is a 100 per cent Aatmanirbhar story and we would like to dedicate it to our farmers. We want to give them at a cost between ₹300 and ₹500 or one-third of what is available in the market now,” he said.

There are 67 semen stations in the country. They will get the technology developed through a supplier. “We are yet to finalise the commercial terms. We don’t want to have a monopoly like the existing companies do,” Shah said.

With new technologies, including the sex semen sorting, in a few years the milk production, which is about 231 million tonnes or one-fourth of the global milk production now, will increase to 300 million tonnes by 2030 or 2032 with a share of 33 per cent of global production, he said.