AKIPRESS.COM - In Kazakhstan, between 2 and 2.5 million families earn a living from the dairy sector and 80 percent of all the country’s milk comes from smallholder farmers who own four or fewer cows, the EBRD reports.

Within the vast borders of Kazakhstan, the world’s ninth largest country, livestock are an important part of people’s livelihoods and food security.

The dairy industry in Kazakhstan faces many challenges, but most of them are directly related to the vast distances that the milk must travel for processing and the high fragmentation of milk supplies.

The country does not have enough milk collection centres to serve the large number of milk producers or meet the demand of milk processors, and the route from farms to dairy processing plants can span hundreds of kilometres, leading to high transport costs and risk of spoilage.

Applying the power of technology for creative solutions, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), together with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), has designed and adapted to the dairy context a mobile app, Collect Mobile, which helps milk processors geo-locate current and potential raw milk suppliers, most of whom are smallholder or family farmers. This connection helps to improve their production and therefore their livelihoods.

Inclusive and efficient food systems create better livelihoods and ultimately help to end hunger.