One of the biggest challenges for farmers around the world is getting fairer cut from the sale of their own produce, and this is even more crucial for Nepali farmers who struggle to live off the sale of each crop. I am determined to get farmers here in Nepal to the markets, rather than them relying on a middle man who will take a large cut of their profits. One of the main issues is many of these farmers live in extremely rural areas, cut off by glacial waters running in huge rivers down from the Himalayas. This makes transport near on impossible!
One district which is moving in the right direction is the eastern district of Ilam, which not only produces tea but also Gouda type cheese; both of which are popular locally and in Kathmandu. Through producing and selling this cheese, the farmers have managed to successfully bring their own milk products to the market and receive a much more healthy profit for their hard work.
By converting milk to cheese not only does the value rise per kilo, but also the product volume is reduced by 90%, allowing transport costs to be covered and still leave extra margin for the cheese maker and the milk-supplying farmers. I hope I’m not getting too technical here, but I really do find this fascinating!
Above - our destination, a small isolated cheese house
Giving a cheese house a helping hand
But there have been some problems recently. Cheese quality is declining and Sudbir, the owner of a cheese house, has asked for our help getting their produce back on track. So it’s with this challenge in mind I joined a small team tasked with visiting the factory to look at the entire cheese making process and try to come up with some suggestions.
After a full day of travelling, including an internal flight and 4 hours driving, me and a team of VSO colleagues arrive in the village of Basantipur, in the Terhathum district. After getting lost down a rough dirt track we eventually arrive at the cheese house, high up in the mountains at an impressive altitude of 2600m (which is significantly higher than even the summit of Ben Nevis). Sudbir was there to greet us, eagerly awaiting our arrival.
The community works together to make a living
This small cheese house produces between eight to ten 4kg cheeses each day from 400 litres of milk. There is an amazing system set up within the region where 150 small milk producers bring their dairy to the cheese house so the whole community is able to benefit. The cheeses must be matured at around 100c for several months, which make these cool moist mountains ideal for the process, since refrigeration is still largely unavailable.
This is Basanta carrying the heavy load, alongside his two friends.
The supplying farmers bring their milk to a few collection points from where it is carried, unchilled, in aluminium cans to the factory. Depending upon the distances involved, the task of carrying these containers, in dokhas (baskets), is done by various teams. The shorter journeys are done by boys like Basanta, who I met. Basanta is only 11 years old and has to carry 38 kilograms of milk up a steep mountainous route. I can’t even imagine how painful that journey would have been. All of this is done before school – Basanta and his two friends then have another hour journey to start their day of learning.
Time for a tasting session
After a visit to the small cheese store and the inevitable tasting session we discovered that the main problem we were to solve is the existence of small holes in the body of the cheeses. These only become apparent when the cheese is cut.
The current cheese with holes in it.
People who have bought the cheese have recently been voicing their dislike of the tiny cavities, even though they are completely harmless. I had some ideas about the causes that were confirmed by watching, with fascination, the entire process.
There were definitely some inadequacies in both the milk pasteurisation and cheese brining stages. These were allowing gas-producing bacteria to survive and multiply to create small gas holes in the final cheeses.
The pressing table in action
Our recommendations
Throughout the day our small team conferred and debated the current scenario eventually coming up with some recommendations. Once the day’s making was completed Rajendra, my Nepali counterpart, gave a short training session attended by the entire team, to share the new knowledge and tweak the cheese making recipe.
The following day we made a re-visit to back up the theory with some practical demonstration during that day’s cheese making. I was really delighted to see the cheese house workers listening carefully, and even writing down the new recipe so they could start to use it straight away. We will certainly be going back over the next couple of months to check all was going well. I will keep you posted!
Sudbir hard at work making cheese to support the whole community
And now to help more thanks to your help
For the future, more visits to other cheese makers in neighbouring Ilam district have been arranged to tackle similar problems with the cheese quality, which I am really looking forward to. Thanks to your support, I am able to help people like Sudbir secure a better income for his family and his employees.
But it’s not just the cheese makers and their families that will be benefitting from our help – the hundreds of small holder dairy farmers will also gain a much better income for their hard work. Your support is helping hundreds all over Nepal – I hope you are proud of the progress!
I look forward to updating you again soon.
Best wishes,
Simon
