A robust assessment of water used in agriculture, including livestock production systems and supply chains, is critical to inform diversification and the development of productivity and sustainable food production systems. This paper presents a detailed analysis of water used and consumed in nine dairy milk processing plants spread across Punjab, India’s leading dairy milk-producing state. Over the five years (2015–2019), the direct water use (DWU) was quantified at 3.31 L of groundwater per kg of milk processed. Only about 26% of the direct water used was consumed, including evaporative losses in various milk processing operations, while the remaining 74% was returned as effluent discharges. The average total water footprint (TWF), accounting for both direct and indirect water consumption, was quantified at 9.0 L of water per kg of milk processed. The majority share (~89%) of the total water footprint was contributed by the indirect water footprint associated with the consumption of electricity (energy) in dairy milk processing activities. The plant’s milk processing capacity and processing products mix also affected significant seasonal and annual variations in the direct and indirect water footprints of dairy milk processing. The analysis also found an inverse relationship between the average total water footprint and the average monthly amount of milk processed in the study plants. Therefore, efforts to reduce the indirect water footprint (associated with energy consumption), the treatment and recycling of effluent discharges, and the optimization of milk processing capacity, the dairy processing product mix, and the locations of dairy processing plants are expected to help reduce the water footprint of dairy processing in the state.

Buffalo is considered as the dairy animal for modern times due to its higher adaptability and productivity in the changing climatic conditions. In India, large part of the milk production comes from small and medium dairy farmers. Buffalo contributes 45.44% to the total milk production in India. With only 3.65% of the total buffalo population of India, Punjab contributes 7.91% of the total buffalo milk production. In Punjab, around 70% milk production comes from small and medium dairy farms with herd size of 2 to 10 animals, another 25% from large/commercial herds and the rest from domestic (1%) and peri-urban dairies (4%), which are concentrated around big cities. In Punjab, buffaloes produce about 56.38% of the total annual milk production in the state. The current study was conducted in three agro-climatic zones of Punjab by selected 90 buffaloes farmers in the district viz. Hoshiarpur, Patiala and Mansa by simple random sampling method. The economics of buffalo was calculated on lactation basis. The average age at 1st calving was 43 months, and inter-calving period was 469 days, lactation length (days) was 281 days, dry period (days) was 188 days, average milk yield (liters/day) was 8.3 lts/day. The lactation-wise total cost of rearing buffalo was highest in 2nd lactation i.e. Rs. 95393 and the net profit was Rs. 52335 in 4th lactation period. Thus, buffaloes contribute positively to the income which makes its rearing beneficial financially.

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Marketing infrastructure includes all those facilities and amenities needed for the smooth conduct of marketing in the economy. The infrastructural facilities in development are as necessary as foundations of a building. The existence of adequate marketing infrastructure are important not only for the performance of various marketing functions and expansion of the size of the markets but also for the transfer of appropriate price signals leading to improved marketing efficiency. The availability of different infrastructures affects the choice of technology to be adopted, reduces the cost of transportation, produces powerful impetus to production and also affects income distribution in favour of small and marginal farmers by raising their access to the market.

A robust analysis of water use in major food production systems is crucial for improving their productivity and sustainability in water-scarce arid and semi-arid regions like Punjab (India) facing the depletion of groundwater resources. This study aimed to assess blue water use and blue water productivity in dairy farming systems across different farm sizes in Punjab. Comprehensive monitoring and assessment of water use over a full year (from July 2022 to June 2023) was conducted on 24 dairy farm sheds in Punjab, revealing significant variability in their blue water use (measured in L per adult animal per day) and blue water productivity quantified as kg of fat- and protein-corrected milk (FPCM) produced per m³ of the blue water consumed. The variability was influenced by factors such as livestock species, farm size (medium with 15–25 livestock, large with 25–100 livestock, and commercial with >100 livestock), bathing and servicing routines, and energy use patterns. The average dairy livestock total blue water consumption varied from 112 ± 14 to 131 ± 19 L per adult animal per day, with 20–40% higher livestock drinking water and about six times higher livestock bathing and serving water used during the summer months. Interestingly, a large share (45%) of the average total blue water consumption is contributed by indirect water consumption via the use of energy (electricity and diesel) in dairy farm sheds. Dairy milk blue water productivity was quantified higher, ranging from 154 ± 11 to 225 ± 59 kg FPCM per m³ in buffalo- and crossbred cattle-based dairy farm sheds. However, indigenous cattle showed a lower blue water productivity ranging from 56 to 97 kg FPCM per m³, reflecting their lower milk yields and limited use of intensified management practices. The state-level water scarcity footprint (WSF) of Punjab dairy farm sheds was quantified at 4870 million m³ world-eq, which showed a significant spatial variation among Punjab districts. However, the results of this study offer novel seasonally and spatially disaggregated benchmarks of blue water consumption, blue water productivity, and the water scarcity footprint of Punjab’s dairy farming sheds. This new information is crucial for the development of locally calibrated and validated models for improving the water productivity and sustainability of dairy farming across Punjab and other similar arid and semi-arid regions in Southeast Asian countries.