You don’t associate the dairy industry with pollution. Yet, in the process of generating one kilo litre of milk, a dairy farm ends up generating three kilo litre of effluents! An official of the Andhra Pradesh Pollution Control Board said that a message is being sent out to dairy farms to be effluent compliant. Intensive dairy farming generates large amounts of cattle waste and this and other effluents can cause water pollution if not treated or disposed of properly.
“In the suburbs of the twin cities, hundreds of dairy farms and sheds have mushroomed. Andhra Pradesh is among the top three states with respect to milk production. In fact, all over this agrarian state, dairy farming is emerging big time and so are the concerns related to pollution, especially water pollution,” said the official. He said the APPCB’s regional offices have been told to keep dairy farms under watch.
While the large farms must install effluent treatment plants to treat waste water coming out of the sheds etc. before releasing the same into open streams, small dairy farmers are being made aware of proper management and handling of dairy waste and the hazards associated with improper disposal. Dairy cattle are a major source of nitrate pollution. Pollution experts revealed that cattle excreta has many disease-causing pathogens including E. coli, cryptosporidium (found in manure prepared from cattle excreta), salmonella and faecal coliform in a highly concentrated form, causing a wide range of diseases in humans. These usually find their way to their human hosts through polluted water streams close to dairy farms.