Abstract:
The objective of the study was to assess hygienic production practices, microbial quality
and marketing of raw cows’ milk and milk products. The study was conducted on survey
work and laboratory analysis. The survey works involved interview of 180 smallholder
milk producers from two agro ecologies in the district while 40 milk samples were
collected in the morning from milk producers, small shops, cafes and consumers for
laboratory analysis. Majority of the respondents (96.7%) did not have separate cow
barn/house and milking area, 57.3% of them clean their barn once and more than once a
week. Moreover, milking without hand washing, absence of udder washing, fail to use
towel to clean the udder, and use of plastic pail as milking equipment were practiced by
33.9, 52.2, 74.4 and 95.6% of the respondents respectively. Furthermore, higher number
of respondents (69.4%) used river/running water as a major source of water for cleaning
purpose without proper treatment and majority of them fail to regularly clean utensils
with detergents. The marketing system in the district was predominantly informal and
milk is channeled from producers to small shops, cafes and to consumers informally,
while milk products are sold directly from producer to the consumers at the market. All
milk sellers are known to transport milk from producers to market (shops and cafes) on
foot and use plastic equipment (81.3%) without any cooling method (62.5%). Fermented
milk (ergo), fresh milk, butter, and cottage cheese were marketed (sold) by 2, 8.9, 44.3,
and 53.7%, of the respondents respectively. Concerning microbial quality, overall mean
total bacterial counts (TBC), Coliform counts (CC) and pH values of milk from current
finding were 5.675±0.016, 4.414±0.017 log cfu/ml and 5.963±0.081, respectively. In
general, overall quality of milk produced as well as marketed in the study area was poor.
This was justified from poor hygienic practices and high values of TBC, CC and pH value
which were significantly higher than the acceptable limits. Therefore, adequate sanitary
and control measures should be taken at all stages from production to consumer level to
produce and supply quality milk.
