Sri Lanka’s Dairy Sector: Where to Move and What to Do – Prediction and a Trend Analysis

Abstract

Sri Lanka is currently producing only about 40% of its milk demand domestically and thus heavily depends on imports to cater for the demand. To attain self-sufficiency in milk, policy formulation and executing appropriate measures in dairy development at the field level are much needed. In this context, this study was conducted to identify recent trends in the dairy sector, modelling dairy production and milking animal populations and suggest potential policy requirements to boost the dairy sector in Sri Lanka. The data on cow and buffalo milk production and population during the last five decades were gathered and a series of trend analyses were conducted using linear, exponential, cubic and quadratic trend models. The best-fitting trend model for each time series was then selected based on the adjusted R-square (R2) value. Trend analysis showed that there are increasing trends in milking cow and buffalo populations, and milk production over the years. As policy implementation, it is important to increase the supply of domestic livestock produce at competitive prices for consumers. There is a great potential for producing milk from buffaloes which has not been exploited in Sri Lanka. Small scale milk processing should be encouraged as the output of such producers, probably when the price of powdered milk increases in the international market.