Number of cows is falling, Albanian farmers cannot keep them as milk is sold cheaply

Toli Qendro, a farmer from the village of Kutalli in Dimal in southern Albania, 3 years ago had 15 cows, while today in the stable there are only his cow Lara and her lamb Balo. He says the farm was emptied of cattle because the dairy industry wants to buy the milk ‘cheaper than water’.

“I used to have 15 cows. Look at the places where they stayed. Now I have only one cow for my family. This is because they buy milk for 350-370 Lek per liter, when a bottle of water is sold for how much? Prices for grass and concentrates have also risen.

If you want to keep the cow so that she does not curse you, as we villagers say, she must live her life as it deserves”, says Qendro.

The lack of subsidies has made that in 2021 there are 53,026 fewer cattle in Albania.

This truth hurts the farmer from Dimali. “The loss of cows hurts me as I had them like members of the family. I fed the family and had an income”, said the farmer.

For him once this stable was the only source of income in the family, while today Lara it is the food of the family. “Lara is the only one now, I have it for yogurt, for milk, I have it for cheese, cottage cheese”, he added.

Stories like Toli’s in our country are not uncommon. Keeping and breeding of livestock does not provide a satisfactory income anymore, so Albanians are now fed on the dairy products of Serbian farmers.

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