Source: tribuneindia.com
Breaking its own previous national record of 66 kg milk yield a day, a Holstein Friesian (HF) cow from Noorpur Hakima village in Moga district today set a new milk yield record by producing 66.713 kg milk in a single day at the milking competition held on the penultimate day of the Eighth National Livestock Championship here.This cow had set the last national record in the competition organised by the Progressive Dairy Farmers’ Association (PDFA) in Jagraon on December 7 last year.The cow owners, Harpreet Singh Hundal and his younger brother Harmanpreet Singh, often participate in various cattle fairs and win trophies.Even in today’s competition, their one more cow got second position with 58 kg yield and another got seventh position in the same category. The state government has given Rs 1.5 lakh prize money to the owners of this national record breaker cow.Elated Harpreet Singh Hundal, who is a graduate in humanities with a simple farming background, said, “This is a proud moment for us as our cow has made the village famous at the national level, which is otherwise infamous for drugs.”Speaking further about this record-breaking cow, he said, “This cow is just six-year old and in its fourth lactation year. This is just like our family member and we will not sell it at any cost, but produce more cows from it using sexed semen.”“We are into the dairy business for the past 10 years and set up an automatic dairy unit about five years ago by investing nearly Rs 3 crore, where we now have 140 cows. All cows have chips inserted in their legs, connected to the computer through a software, which monitors their activity like their intake, milk yield per day and one lactation year and of throughout life,” added Harpreet Singh.
However, on being asked about what kind of feed is given to the cow, Harpreet did not reveal the secret. He simply said, “We have hired services of a private feed manufacturing company and their officials provide us some special feed as per their formulation. Besides, we give green fodder, wheat straw and maize silage to cows. I can only say that this cow is expected to give 17,000-kg milk in one lactation year of 305 days.”This cow owner is, however, not satisfied with the assistance being provided by the state government.“Holding such championships is not sufficient. The state government must act tough with those selling spurious milk to promote dairy farming. Further, the role of middlemen must come to an end. The government only provides subsidy of Rs 1.5 lakh on making cow shed of 40×60 ft, which is not enough,” said Harpreet.At present, he is selling milk to Nestle at Rs28 per kg.Inderjit Singh, Director, Dairy Development Department, Punjab, said, “This HF cow has set another milk yield record by breaking its own previous national record. The department is doing enough to promote dairies. We give 50 per cent subsidy on indigenous cows and 25 per cent subsidy on exotic breeds, but up to 10 cows. Further, there is 50 per cent subsidy available on milking machine.”
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