Camel and Cow Milk Marketing Chain Analysis : The Case of Ethiopia

Milk has a very wide importance both as a source of food and source of income in pastoral and agro-pastoral areas. On the contrary, the level of milk production is very low because of low production from endogenous milk cow and camel. Even at the present level of milk production, the product suffered lack of market and low price. Measures to solve the problem were limited partly for reasons of little research done and lack of attention given to the livestock subsector by policy makers. Hence, this study was initiated to partially fill this gap. The study used Heckman selection and Multiple linear regression models to indentify factors affecting Cow and Camel milk marketed surplus, respectively. The Policy relevant variables identified for both milk are number of milk cows and camels, access to market information, income from non-dairy sources and market price of cow and camel milk. The S-C-P model identified that the markets for camel and cow milk in the study area were non-competitive type. Generally, camel and cow milk market in the study area seemed to be inefficient and underdeveloped.