Sambalpur, July 7: Dairy farmers of Sambalpur district are angry about Omfed's refusal to procure milk from them two days every month.

The Omfed has decided not to buy milk on the 4th and 12th of every month.

General manager of the Omfed plant in Sambalpur Kishor Nayak said: "The decision was taken in view of the excess production of milk. We used to collect nearly 80,000 litres from 430 collection points in the region. However, the dairy farmers are supplying around 1.10 lakh litres now and we have been collecting more than one lakh litres of the milk from dairy farmers every day for the past 20 days. The plant here does not have the capacity to process and store excess milk. Hence, a decision was taken not to procure milk on the 4th and 12th of this month."

On July 4, the Omfed had not procured milk from dairy farmers of the region. The farmers had protested against this decision by pouring milk on the road and at the milk collection centres.

"Around Rs 20 is spent to produce one litre of milk. But the Omfed did not to procure the milk from the dairy farmers on July 4. The farmers incurred a huge loss that day. Now, they have decided not to procure milk on July 12," said Kushdhwaj Choudhury, a dairy farmer.

"The Omfed collected milk from dairy farmers in other parts of state on July 4. This is injustice. If the Omfed does not procure milk from the dairy farmers on July 12, we will be forced to resort to agitation," he said.

The farmers have submitted a memorandum to district collector Nilambar Mahanand, who assured them to forward it to authorities concerned. "Though milk was not procured from dairy farmers on July 4, they were given Rs 8 a litre that day," said Nayak.