Tuesday, September 11, 2012

A Tribute To The Milkman Of India

There have ever been only two milkmen whose fame has been unmatched. Both of them belonged to India and had chosen the same part of India - Gujarat as their 'karma bhoomi'. One is Lord Shri Krishna and the other is Dr. Verghese Kurien. There have been a good amount of obituaries on Verghese in the media after his death yesterday, 9th Sep. 2012. Here is my take on this great man who changed the face of India in many ways and impacted the way agriculture was done - just as any other business enterprise.




1. Dairy: India's Dairy farming had the best moment when Verghese Kurien, being his stubborn self, has insisted on processing and converting milk to milk powder. This he did inspite of the so called 'best in industry' - Nestle and scientists from New Zealand said it that it is bound to fail. He was proud to be stubborn. What started as a small revolution in a small milk cooperative in Gujarat's rural heartland has, in no time transformed into what we know as the White Revolution. It changed India from a milk importer to the largest producer of milk on earth. Till date business schools across the world are amazed and do case studies on the way Indian dairy industry transformed it self



The Times of India has famously quoted that when it asked Dr. Kurien to pose along with a cow for one of its featured articles, he insisted on posing with a buffalo. The reason being that it was the buffalo that changed the face of Indian dairy industry and was instrumental in getting India to self sufficiency in dairy



2. Processed Food: It wont be untrue if I say that this industry started with Dr. Kurien. His insistence of processing milk to milk powder so that milk can be stored for a longer period in time coupled with the transportation/logistics/storage/supply chain associated with this industry were all a result of his vision. It is said that Nestle has declared the idea of converting buffalo milk to milk powder was a failure to begin with. The world until that time has known of milk powder made out of cow milk which was more freely available in Europe and ANZ, the two biggest dairy cultivating countries until that time. I read somewhere that he stormed out of NestlĂ©’s board meeting when his idea of 'milk to milk powder' was termed as a failure. We were fortunate that he stuck to his guns. It is very important for a country like India to focus more on storage and processing of food so that we eliminate poverty and malnutrition from our country. This is more relevant in this day and time when there is a big debate on FDI in retail and the advantages that it might get to the entire food processing and supply chain system



3. Cooperatives: Verghese Kurien has not just been instrumental in Operation Flood or the White Revolution but he was also instrumental in the 'cooking oil revolution' of India which was done under the 'Dhara' umbrella whereas the dairy revolution was under the 'Amul' umbrella



It was this cooperative movement that started well before the micro-credit program by the Bangladeshi Grameena Bank started by Muhammad Yunus was in limelight. This was the cooperative movement that empowered women and small time farmers and got them the bargaining power that they needed to stand to their point against the middlemen and big milk producers/companies. The revolution on the oil front was not as huge as the milk revolution and the reasons attributed to this is the politics of the big fish in this game and the political lobbying.



4. Rural Management: It was another examples of the Malayalee visionary who did not understand Gujarati when he embarked on his journey of transforming India. He has made the Gujarati old man very proud with his vision and the need that he felt that Indian agriculture, cooperatives and rural development needed professional management a la any other corporate entity. This is the basis on which IRMA, one of the best known institutes of its kind in the world was formed. Yes, Indian agriculture and rural development needs professional management. Can anyone deny that? Has anyone thought about this need earlier? This is what makes Dr. Kurien an extraordinary visionary.



An offshoot result of his vision is the 'Amul Cartoons' which are considered as a corner stone of Indian advertising history - with a cartoon and an Amul girl commenting on the issues of the day. The day when Dr. Kurien passed away, the cartoon paid him a tribute with:







Dr. Varghese Kurien rightly deserves a Bharat Ratna. He is one, even without being awarded that. He shall remain a ratna in the hearts of the millions of the three million odd small time farmers who are members of the cooperative that he has founded. Let’s not forget that one of the greatest pacifists to have walked on this earth, another Gujarati, has never been awarded the greatest peace prize of this planet. But, that has not belittled him. Nor would government recognition of the contribution of Dr. Kurien will endorse his dedication. If the government chooses to award him with a Bharat Ratna, albeit posthumously, then, in reality it will be recognizing itself.