Donkey milk, which has little worth in India, has made Dhiren Solanki a a hit farmer in Gujarat. He tapped into its global call for within the pharmaceutical and cosmetics business, putting in place a trade inside two years.
“If I had grow to be a central authority instructor, I’d be incomes Rs 30,000 in a month – an quantity that I generate in kind of 3 days. With the federal government task, I will have best cleared my EMIs, now not fulfilled my desires.”
In 2022, Dhiren Solanki give up his myth of touchdown a central authority task to grow to be a farmer. Not like conventional agriculture practices, he became to making a livelihood out of donkeys!
Traditionally, donkeys had been basically used as pack animals to tug ploughs and carts, ship items to marketplace, gather water from wells, and within the development business. Alternatively, those donkeys are hardly ever used as agricultural animals like cows, buffaloes, and goats.
Curiously, donkeys have grow to be a just right income supply for Dhiren. At 22, he arrange a multi-lakh trade incomes Rs 3 lakh per thirty days by means of promoting donkey milk. In dialog with The Higher India, he explains how he stood out in making donkey milk a winning farming trade.
Donkey milk – a hidden gem
Like his father, Dhiren’s youth aspiration was once to pursue a profession in instructing. So, after finishing his training in science, he began making ready for the federal government examinations in 2020.
“There are restricted vacancies for presidency jobs and there’s an excessive amount of pageant on this box. Anyway, I seemed for lots of state and central-level examinations in February 2020 however I didn’t get any effects. I used to be sitting idle for a minimum of six months, I didn’t know what to do and was once simply looking ahead to my effects. I used to be getting demotivated,” he says.
In early 2021, his father learn in regards to the donkey-rearing trade in Karnataka and Kerala. “This idea was once under no circumstances popularised within the North. Even though there’s little call for for donkey milk within the nation, it has large call for in nations like Turkey, Malaysia, and China,” he provides.
“At a time when individuals are afflicted by means of hovering costs of cow and buffaloes milk at Rs 60 in keeping with litre, they aren’t inquisitive about purchasing donkey milk which is bought for Rs 3,500 a litre. But it surely has a world marketplace and is extensively utilized in pharmaceutical and cosmetics industries to make merchandise like moisturisers, child cream, and soaps,” he provides.
A 2020 analysis article unearths that donkey milk stimulates the immune device, regulates the gastrointestinal plants, and stops inflammatory illnesses. It has lengthy been used as a substitute for babies and sufferers with Cow’s Milk Protein Hypersensitive reaction (CMPA).
Dhiren says the call for for donkey milk additionally higher amid the COVID-19 pandemic to make immunity-boosting capsules. Instead of its attainable roles in human diet, donkey milk is utilized in ethnomedicine, and cosmetology, possibly because of its lysozyme content material, and smoothing pores and skin and scalp inflammations.
Taking into account a possible trade alternative, Dhiren shifted his focal point to arrange a donkey farm in his village Manund of Patan district, Gujarat.
Didn’t get held up after Rs 40 lakh losses
In 2022, Dhiren began TDS Donkey Farm with none formal coaching. For this, he additionally took a mortgage of Rs 37 lakh to shop for 20 donkeys and arrange a 40×30 toes shed.
“I took the danger as I used to be assured and sure. However I lost sight of the danger and my determination became out to be improper,” he says.
“I believed that I’d acquire donkeys, milk them someday, and promote their milk day after today. This was once under no circumstances conceivable. I didn’t believe its low shelf existence. There was once no correct native marketplace for it and it will now not be despatched in a foreign country in its liquid shape by the use of airplane or send because of this,” he stocks.
Within the first 12 months, he incurred losses as much as Rs 40 lakh as he needed to throw 3,000 litres of milk down the drain. The one answer was once to move the milk in a foreign country by means of changing it into dry powder shape for transportation. But it surely took him a 12 months to know this and in finding appropriate corporations that did this procedure.
“I sought assist from a advertising corporate and acquired their annual package deal of Rs 3.5 lakh which introduced in consumers. After greater than a 12 months, I were given my first order of fifty kg milk powder,” he provides.
By way of that point, Dhiren had already saved 200 kg of milk powder. He stocks, “It takes 17 litres of milk to make one kg powder. It’s bought for Rs 63,000 in keeping with kg within the global marketplace,” he provides.
After preliminary hiccups, Dhiren was once ready to scale up the trade and step by step expanded his farm to 50 donkeys. The present day-to-day milk manufacturing at his farm is set 15 litres.
He provides that he additionally guarantees the overall well-being of the donkeys at his farm. “We be sure that the donkeys aren’t exploited for milk. In our village, now we have a veterinary health center very as regards to our farm. We get them handled and vaccinated for tetanus once a year and provides them B-complex dietary supplements each and every month,” he provides.
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Taking a look again at his good fortune, Dhiren says, “With this paintings, I think I’ve additionally been ready to lift some admire for donkeys which might be regarded as of no worth within the Indian setup. But even so, I’ve additionally been ready to get popularity at an overly younger age. Had I been in a central authority task, no one would have identified of my lifestyles,” he says.
Edited by means of Padmashree Pande. All footage: Dhiren Solanki.