[en] The amount of potassium in imported processed milk was determined by gamma spectral analysis. The results show that the potassium content of diluted infant formula milk is closest to the reported mean concentration of potassium in human milk while other milk types have potassium values similar to the potassium content of cow milk. (Auth.). 2 figs., 5 refs

[en] Full text: Milk production in Cameroon was estimated at 184 000 tons. Yet the demand of milk products is far above production and 24% of national consumption is imported. Due to urbanization and population growth, milk production needs to double by the year 2020 if it is to meet the demand. Therefore, efforts have been made to increase dairy production. However the efforts of non-governmental organizations, research and government institutions failed to significantly boost domestic dairy production because farmers did not see the economic gain associated with potential biological improvements. A hypothesis was then devised whereby an integration of interventions at the level of farmers associating nutrition, health, reproduction and management would bring more economic benefits to smallholder farmers and improve dairy production. This involved reviewing dairy research done in Cameroon, carrying out a participatory rural appraisal and an economic opportunity survey at selected dairy farms, setting up various interventions on farms, investigating postpartum return to oestrus, evaluating milk quality and the impact of integrated interventions. This paper intends to critically evaluate the results of different studies and present the integrated method developed in this research. It also aims to set up guidelines for a successful sustainable improvement of dairy production in Cameroon. The study involved reviewing dairy research done in Cameroon. A participatory rural appraisal and an economic opportunity survey were carried out in selected dairy farms. On-farm interventions were set up, investigating cow reproduction, evaluating milk quality, setting up an artificial insemination centre and the impact of integrated interventions. Guidelines for improvement of the dairy sector were drawn. These series of experiments were designed to evaluate the impact of interventions carried out holistically. In small-scale dairy systems the uptake and use of research results by wider communities of farmers, organization and livestock extension services has often been less than expected. This in turn resulted in interventions for supplementary feeding, or for improving reproductive performance that did not demonstrate an economic benefit to the farmers. One of the reasons is that they focused only on one constraint or one discipline at a time, and other concurrent production problems were limiting the economic benefits. This study has developed an integrated method in improving dairy production in Cameroon and has found that marketing and milk production per cow per day were the most limiting factors of dairy improvement. Interventions were carried out to solve these constraints and others. Farmers adopting interventions had returns of 193% and 232% with or without opportunity costs proving the positive impact of interventions using the integrated method. The integrated method in solving these constraints will bring much improvement and clear economic benefits to smallholder farmers, proving its effectiveness in ensuring improvement of dairy systems in Cameroon. These interventions need to be spread to more farms in the country. This method needs to be adopted for further dairy production improvement by the creation of multidisciplinary intervention teams and the training of integrated intervention specialists in the dairy sector. The application of integrated interventions in dairying requires the synergistic action from the government, researchers, non-governmental organizations and farmers. It requires expertise from many different fields and calls for the need to create integrated action teems in each administrative region. Each team will be multidisciplinary constituted of an extension agent, an animal nutritionist, a veterinarian, a socio-economist, a dairy technologist and a reproduction scientist. It is quite likely that there be a lack of such specialists in each subdivision. In which case there can be a creation of intervention teams covering special areas of the country. It is not that these intervention teams will replace the private sector but they will guide local authorities in the extension of research results and in actions needed for regulation, advice and support the private sector. (author)

[en] This article reviews the literature describing the transfer of radionuclides from whole milk to milk products. The principal nuclides of interest are radiocaesium. The behaviour of these and other nuclides during milk processing is considered in some detail. The effectiveness of techniques specifically designed to decontaminate whole milk is also examined. It is clear that a considerable reduction in the contamination of the final product relative to that of the raw milk may be achieved. In general 50 % and, in some cases, greater than 90 % decontamination may be realised

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[en] Full text: Mauritius is totally dependent on importation for its milk and milk products. The present local milk production amounts to 4.0M litres of milk annually (400 MT dry equivalent) which represent only 2% of the total local requirements for milk (21, 700MT). Milk and milk products imports cost the country around Rs 2 billion (1 U$ ∼ Rs30) annually. The recent successive increases in prices of imported milk have impacted negatively on the food import bills and the retail price of powdered milk has also increased drastically. The dairy sector in Mauritius is mainly characterised by backyard producers operating on a low input- low output system. Over the years, the number of cattle and farmers has declined steadily from 9600 in 2000 to 5800 head in 2006 while the number of farmers has also declined from 2500 to 1700 for the same period. In the past, a wide range of initiatives has been taken to develop the domestic milk sector, but milk production has not increased. Under the present circumstances, it is imperative to revamp the local milk production sector. In this context, the Government has drafted developmental policies for boosting the milk sector. However, such policy needs to be implemented through a coherent framework of actions. This study attempts to firstly to gain a better understanding of the existing potentials and constraints of the smallholder dairy industry and secondly to propose an approach for successful implementation of the policies. In an extensive questionnaire based survey with the dairy producers and interviews with key informants in the sector, the main factors identified for the decline of the dairy herd population and productivity are increasing cost of production, ageing of cow breeders, better job opportunities offered to the younger and educated generation in other sectors of the economy, distorted economic policy, poor genetic potential of the herd, limited land availability for cultivating pasture, seasonal scarcity of fodder and grass, low quality of concentrates, inefficient marketing facilities scheme and reproductive problems mainly due to inefficient artificial insemination service. The survey has also shown that the dairy producers are socially, economically and technically diverse. A new category of dairy producers is now investing in medium and large sized scale dairying production systems. One of the medium sized farms is now producing about 1000 litres of milk daily. A holistic approach is being proposed to increase milk production over the next 10 years. The 3 main strategies being proposed are setting up and operation of 10-20 dairy units, equipped with appropriate housing systems and modern equipment, scattered around the island. These dairy units will be rented to selected farmers who have proven experience in dairy farming and those who have followed training courses in milk production. The second one proposes to restructure the existing medium sized dairy farms such as dairy cooperatives to increase their efficiency and effectiveness of producing milk of good quality. Finally, the last strategy is to build large-scale farms on land that would be released following the restructuring of the sugar cane industry. The successful implementation of the strategies hinges on the following approaches; supply of dairy cattle stock of good genetic potential adaptable to the local conditions, development of appropriate infrastructure and logistics (e.g., housing), ensuring a regular supply of fodder and concentrates feeds, provision of more veterinary support to the dairy farmers, adoption of sound reproductive management of the herd, improvement of the technical education of farmers and farm staff through training, and the development of an organized system of milk collection and marketing schemes. It is postulated that the adoption of these strategies will benefit the local dairy industry through increased herd size, and increased availability of fresh quality milk and the development of sustainable and environmental friendly dairy enterprises. The data generated from the survey has been fitted into a model to estimate the total acreage of land, number of animals, total feed requirements and herd progression over the years for the implementation of the proposals. It is estimated that milk production can be increased to about 22 million litres of milk by 2015, which would represent a 10% self-sufficiency ratio in fresh milk. (author)

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[en] This paper presents the results of experimental studies on heat and mass transfer during a microwave freeze dehydration process. An experimental system and procedure was developed to freeze dry milk. A 2500-W microwave system with an appropriate wave guide was set up and instrumented, and a procedure was experimentally developed to obtain milk powder first by freezing milk and then dehydrating it at low pressure using microwave energy. An unsteady-state analysis was used to derive a one-dimensional mathematical model of the freeze dehydration process in a microwave electromagnetic field

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