The milky way


There is one thing I simply can't find at the Aavin dairy in Sholinganallur — cows. For a plant that processes close to 3.8 lakh litres of milk a day, all I see is just a lot of gleaming stainless steel, twisted into pipes and shaped into six enormous silos, standing guard at the entrance. I've just driven down the busy OMR, and entered the sprawling dairy. A ‘wash your hands and feet' board welcomes me as I enter the low, one-storied building, and I dip my feet in a trough of water laced with disinfectant. “Where are the cows?” I ask, as soon as I meet two Aavin employees. They smile indulgently; I suppose they get asked this a lot. “All our milk comes from Salem, Coimbatore, Tiruchi and Thanjavur. The Corporation does not allow cows to be reared within city limits,” I'm told. “But I've seen many cows in the city,” I argue. “We don't buy that milk; all our cows are registered, they're under the care of our veterinarians, while the farmers are taught good hygiene practices,”they say.

Cold chain

But wherever they live, they're milked by hand at 4 a.m. and the milk is transferred in an unbroken cold chain, until it reaches the dairy in massive 9000-litre tankers. There's one behemoth standing right outside the building, pumping the milk into the silo. “Touch the tanker; is it cold?” Dr. K. Anbarasu, the dairy bacteriologist, asks me. “Umm, no,” I reply. “Good, because that means the tanker is well-insulated. Now touch the valve.” It's cold and especially refreshing, in the searing heat of the afternoon. “That's milk at 6 degree C,” he smiles, adding that this is the only point where you can actually see the milk flow. “After this, you only get to see it in the packet.”

I'm happily surprised; this is automation of a very high order, and even though the romantic in me laments the lost drawing-milk-from-the-udder photo opportunities, the inner end-customer is secretly pleased at all the care lavished to keep milk germ-free.......Read More

Source: The Hindu


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