New Delhi, April 15, 2026: Amul, the cooperative that started with 250 litres of milk a day in 1946, crossed ₹1 lakh crore in annual sales last year. And according to its Managing Director Jayen Mehta, the biggest chapter of India’s dairy story is still ahead.
Speaking to ET Now, Mehta laid out a sweeping vision for where India’s dairy sector is headed — and why recent policy decisions, structural changes, and cooperative economics are converging to create a once-in-a-generation opportunity.
From 250 litres to 350 lakh litres a day
The scale of Amul’s growth is staggering. What began with two village societies in Gujarat now spans 18,600 villages, operates through 18 member unions, runs over 120 dairy plants, and sells approximately 1,200 SKUs across 28 lakh retail outlets in India. It exports to more than 50 countries.
“India has a very good opportunity to become dairy to the world,” he said.
Milk is now India’s biggest agricultural crop
A fact that surprises many: the value of India’s milk output now exceeds the combined value of wheat, paddy, and oilseeds. Around 10 crore families depend on dairy for their livelihood, making it not just an agricultural sector but a social and economic backbone for rural India.
GST cuts are a landmark moment
Mehta described the 2025 GST reductions on dairy products as one of the most significant policy decisions in the sector’s history. The changes are substantial — ghee and butter dropped from 12% to 5%, ice cream from 18% to 5%, and paneer and UHT milk moved to zero.
The impact works on multiple levels. First, it shrinks the gap between what consumers pay and what farmers receive — a gap that is already unusually small in India. Mehta noted that when a consumer spends ₹100 on an Amul product, over 80% flows back directly to the milk producer. In the US, Europe, and New Zealand, that figure is typically 35–40% according to the reports published in economictimes.indiatimes.com.
Second, the GST cuts have removed the tax arbitrage that allowed unorganised players to undercut branded products by operating outside the tax system. With that incentive gone, Mehta expects more milk to move into the organised sector, benefiting both farmers and consumers through consistent quality and reputable brands.
Value addition is where the real opportunity lies
The shift from loose, unpackaged milk to pasteurised pouches was itself a major leap in value addition. But India’s dairy sector is now moving well beyond that — into dahi, buttermilk, lassi, cheese, butter, ghee, and processed products that carry higher margins and longer shelf lives.
Mehta is clear that milk’s nutritional density makes it uniquely versatile as a raw material. Few foods deliver protein, calcium, vitamins, and minerals in such a digestible and convenient form — and that gives dairy companies an almost unlimited canvas for product development.
The cooperative advantage
On the question of cooperatives versus private dairy companies, Mehta was measured but firm. Both play a role in growing the sector, he said, but the cooperative model’s core purpose — maximising returns to the farmer rather than to shareholders — is what enables India’s unusually high producer-to-consumer revenue ratio.
That ratio, he argues, is not just an ethical achievement. It is a competitive one that private models elsewhere in the world have consistently failed to match.
