Ghee and chhana earn about Tk300 a maund, yogurt nearly Tk1,800 — so a Ghosh village shifts

In the Ghoshpara of Ufulki village in Mirzapur upazila, Tangail, ghee, chhana and sour yogurt have been made from milk since the time of their forefathers. More than a hundred families, Hindu and Muslim together, are involved in this work. When milk is poured into the 'milk-separating machine', butter or cream comes out of one side, from which ghee is made; from the thin milk on the other side come chhana and sour yogurt. Run by hand, it can separate about eight maunds of milk an hour. On average 70–80 maunds of milk are processed a day, and the products go to Mirzapur, Tangail, Keraniganj and Chawkbazar in Dhaka, and Narayanganj.

One maker gave Prothom Alo the full calculation. One maund of milk yields on average one and a quarter kg of ghee and seven to eight kg of chhana. Buying a maund of milk at Tk 60 a kg costs Tk 2,400; with wages and fuel the cost is about Tk 2,900. Selling the ghee and chhana brings in Tk 3,040 to Tk 3,260 — a profit of a little over Tk 300. Making sour yogurt brings in about Tk 3,200, a profit of about Tk 1,800. So they are leaning more towards yogurt.

Milk is bought according to orders — 12–14 maunds when there are more, 8–10 maunds when there are fewer. One local said people eat more ghee in winter, and the price is a little better then too. Many have left the ancestral trade; the rest want government support.