Dairy farmers in Punjab have witnessed 15-20% fall in milk output in wake of lumpy pores and skin illness outbreak within the state, Progressive Dairy Farmers’ Association (PDFA) mentioned on Sunday.

With the contagious illness affecting cattle, particularly cows, and in addition inflicting mortality amongst animals, the small and medium dairy farmers, whose livelihood fully is dependent upon livestock, had been the worst-affected, it mentioned.

According to knowledge supplied by the state’s animal husbandry division, complete 1.26 lakh cattle have been affected by lumpy pores and skin illness (LSD) whereas greater than 10,000 animals have died to this point due to the infectious illness.

However, the PDFA claims that a couple of lakh cattle have died within the state as a result of LSD since July. Notably, LSD has primarily affected cows with a number of districts, together with Fazilka, Muktsar, Faridkot, Bathinda and Tarn Taran, being the worst-affected areas within the state.

The illness spreads quickly amongst animals by means of flies, mosquitoes and ticks. It causes delicate blister-like nodules everywhere in the physique, fever, runny nostril, watery eyes, salivation, lowered milk yield and problem in consuming.

“Because of the outbreak of LSD, milk production in Punjab has dropped by around 15-20 per cent,” mentioned PDFA president Daljit Singh Sadarpura.

“Because of mortality among cattle and animals being affected by LSD, average milk production of cows is expected to remain low for at least one year,” he asserted.

Punjab’s complete milk manufacturing of cows and buffaloes is round 3 crore liters per day, out of which 1.25 crore liters is offered available in the market, mentioned Sadarpura.

Punjab has round 22 lakh cows. Sadarpura mentioned dairy farmers have been the worst affected due to the contagious illness.

Dairy farmers, a couple of days again, had met Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and sought compensation of 50,000 per animal which died of LSD.

The animal husbandry division has administered round 5.94 lakh doses of vaccine to animals as a way to test the unfold of the illness. It has additionally focused to vaccinate 10 lakh extra cattle subsequent week.