'Local milk production should be increased'

Ramani KANGARAARACHCHI

Imports of milk products to Sri Lanka is on the increase despite 35 percent of the required production is locally produced when it should be the other way round.

The country's first local milk food manufacturer and Mawbima Lanka Foundation Chairman Ariyaseela Wickramanayake told Daily News Business.

He said that the country has imported 83,000 mt of milk in 2011 compared to 57,000 mt in 2010, which is an increase of 26,000 mt and that is the largest quantity imported so far. With the US dollar gaining grounds the country will have to pay huge amounts of foreign exchange for the importation of milk powder.

This is the very reason for the recent increase of oil prices and in another six months time the country will have no foreign exchange to buy fuel if people consume imported milk powder at this rate destroying the local milk producer, he said.

Wickramanayake said that the plan with the dawn of peace in the country was to make Sri Lanka self-sufficient in milk products in three years time and there were budget proposal to curtail the import of milk powder in 2011.