It is a key element for household food security. The generation of surplus milk brings income to women and children who are usually in charge of the milk-producing animals such as goats, sheep and cows. Milk can frequently generate the only regular income for rural families and is therefore essential for their survival. In remote areas where there is a huge demand for fresh, good quality milk, small-scale milk producers face a major problem in accessing distant markets. Most of the small farmers have no direct access to the market.
Middlemen therefore take the biggest share of the consumer milk price.
Milk can usually be transported unrefrigerated for up to 20 km but after a certain period will begin to deteriorate. Souring sets in and the milk quickly becomes useless. Milk is the last nutritional link between a mammalian mother and her offspring. As well as providing a complete and balanced diet for the newborn calf, kid or human baby, milk also contains antibacterial agents to protect the sucking young from various infectious diseases. The knowledge that milk, and particularly colostrum contains immune factors essential for the survival of offspring is not new, and research in Sweden on colostrum in the 1960's led to the discovery of a naturally occurring enzymatic preservation system in milk.