Andhra Pradesh recorded nearly 26% increase in milk production in the last six years — from 1.21 crore tonnes in 2016-17 to 1.54 crore tonnes in 2022-23 — as per the basic animal husbandry statistics released by the Union government a few days ago.
The state, which accounts for 6.7% of the country’s total milk production, stood in fifth place among all states in 2022-23.
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As always, AP occupied first place in egg production with over 20% share in the country’s total production. Egg production is also going northwards with each passing year in AP. Neighbouring Telangana is the third largest egg producing state in the country with a share of 12.77%.
As per the data, AP was the fourth largest meat producing state in 2022-23. While 12.5 lakh buffaloes were slaughtered for meat, nearly 2 crore sheep met with the same fate in 2022-23. Similarly, 52 lakh goats were slaughtered in the last fiscal.
The state, however, did not produce any wool in 2022-23. This was mainly attributed to the state’s shift to meat production-based cultivation. AP used to produce about 7-8 lakh kg of wool per annum until a few years ago. For instance, the state accounted for nearly 11% of the total wool production of the country in 2014. There has been a gradual decline over the years, and it has now come down to zero. The total wool production in the country was 33.61 million kg during 2022-23. This registered a negative growth of 16.84% over the past five years as compared to the estimates of 40.42 million kg during 2018-19.
Of the 9.77 million tonnes of meat production, over 51% came from poultry. The top five meat producing states in 2023 were Uttar Pradesh (12.20%), West Bengal (11.93%), Maharashtra (11.50%), Andhra Pradesh (11.20%) and Telangana (11.06%). They together contributed 57.90% of total meat production in the country.
Andhra Pradesh has a per capita availability of 799 grams of milk a day, almost two times higher than the national average of 459 grams. Milk production from exotic/crossbred cattle increased by 3.75% and indigenous/non-descript cattle by 2.63% as compared to previous year. Milk production from buffaloes also increased by 3.69%.
The per capita availability of eggs in India reached 101 eggs per annum in 2022-23, a six-point jump from 95 eggs in 2021-22. AP’s per capita availability of eggs stood at 526, six times higher than the national average.
Source : The Times of India Dec 3rd 2023
