Officials said the recovery came from plugging leakages from village-level procurement to retail counters. Madurai : At a time when private dairies have repeatedly raised retail prices, Aavin has stepped up supply to meet rising demand in Madurai. Through digital monitoring of procurement, action against hoarding and improved procurement policies, the cooperative has, for the first time, made more than two lakh litres available daily to consumers.
Aavin has about 900 depots meant to sell only its milk and products, but officials said some were holding back packets. Aavin Gold, used largely for domestic consumption, sells at Rs 56 a litre in Madurai, while private dairies sell the same variant at Rs 86 a litre. Even at around Rs 60 a litre, hotels and tea shops could save substantially compared with private milk, creating a ready market for packets diverted from Aavin depots. Last week, Aavin inspected 53 licensed outlets and found 36 selling private dairy products in violation of licence conditions. Notices were issued to all 36, while private products found inside the outlets were removed.
Because procurement was poor, according to T Muthumadhavan, general manager of Aavin Madurai, after withholding Aavin milk, salesmen told consumers that supplies had fallen. Because of a shortage of milk, muthumadhavan said the practice created a false impression that Aavin was undersupplying outlets. Because shutting several neighbourhood depots together could disrupt milk availability, officials avoided immediate closure of the outlets.
“They then sold private brands and earned commissions from private distributors and agents,” he said. In reality, he said, the union was sending larger quantities than before to meet rising demand. Despite receiving these benefits, some outlets diverted withheld packets to hotels and tea shops, officials said.
Curbing diversion at retail outlets The biggest problem was hoarding at Aavin’s own licensed retail depots rather than by outsiders. Aavin supports these licensed outlets through subsidised rent and electricity, apart from supplying milk. Instead, supplies to violating outlets were reduced and linked more closely to their declared daily requirement.
The TVK government strengthened that pull by raising the qualifying cow-milk procurement price by Rs 6, from Rs 38 to Rs 44 a litre. Buffalo milk rose from Rs 47 to Rs 53, with the revised rates effective from Sept 1. The cow-milk rate meets an earlier producer demand, but associations had sought Rs 60 a litre for buffalo milk.
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The pilot covers 629 primary societies, which together procure about 1.41 lakh litres of milk every day. Farmers who earlier waited 15 to 20 days are now paid within about a week, based on Daily Milk Report data. Farmers and societies supplying better-quality milk therefore had little financial advantage.
Officials said Aavin wants to remove the manufacturing date and print only the use-by date, discouraging hotels and tea shops from buying milk held beyond its intended cycle. Earlier, procurement records focused mainly on quantity, and societies often received similar rates despite differences in milk quality, said Venmani Chandran, TN Milk Distributors Association. Payments have also accelerated, officials said. “Better transparency and quicker payments are helping draw back farmers who had moved to private dairies for better returns,” said Chandran.
Aavin is also planning a packaging change to make overnight hoarding harder. Milk dispatched in the evening currently carries the next day’s manufacturing date, allowing withheld packets to be passed off as fresh the following morning. Fixing procurement at village level With help from two students at Sethu Engineering College, Aavin Madurai has addressed procurement gaps at primary societies that other milk unions continue to face. Using the MAX software deployed by Aavin headquarters in Chennai as its base, Madurai developed an internal portal called Aavin Aaivu (meaning inspection). The portal tracks the quantity and quality of milk reaching bulk milk cooling centres across the division. This meant diluted milk could receive the same payment as supplies meeting the required fat and solids-not-fat, or SNF, values. Aavin Aaivu now links recorded quality more closely to the amount payable. Milk with better fat and SNF values earns the appropriate higher rate, while poorer-quality supplies receive less. Quantity and quality can now be monitored in real time from the Madurai head office. Spot acknowledgements are also sent instantly through WhatsApp to society administrators, showing milk quantity, fat, SNF and society codes. Expanding supply, bringing farmers back Madurai has also widened its supply pool by drawing more milk from Theni, Virudhunagar and other nearby areas.