Pasteurizing milk the cottage industry way
By Young Hoy Kim Kimaro
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Most farmers in Mwika own a cow or two, the local type with hump back. They are kept for manure mostly; milk is only a minor side benefit, barely 2 lt. a day. Milk is typically boiled before consuming, but hardly long enough for it to be safe.
In 2005, a plant was built to pasteurize milk at Kondiki parish in Mwika. The plant was housed in the parish’s underutilized office building which had a large meeting room with several offices around it.
In 2007, like-minded villagers in Mwika who saw the potential in milk production for enhancing farm income, rallied together to bring to Mwika 80 heifers of improved variety. That paid off. By 2008, the volume of milk processed at the plant had grown from 50 liters per day to over 350 liters. In the excitement, I volunteered to be a one-day photo-journalist to record every aspect of the plant’s operation.
At 6 a.m. it was still dark outside when I arrived at the milk plant. A line of villagers bringing milk to sell to the plant had started to form. They carried milk in containers of all sizes, shapes and color. But all containers had one thing in common; they had a small opening for pouring out the contents. How on earth can they keep those clean ...? What if some had been used previously for toxic substances like cleaning agents…? Plant staff receiving milk weighed each and tested with lactometer.
I was ushered into a large hall, totally bare except for a stainless steel cylindrical tank, gleaming at the far end, just sitting there with nothing connected to it.
“‘Tis a cooling tank,” Hargai, who was my designated guide for the day, explained. “But it doesn’t work. It never has.”
The loading dock suddenly came to life. Sour milk in packets, in covered plastic buckets and barrels were loaded onto the delivery truck. On its doors on either side, its association with “Kondiki Dairy” was proclaimed loudly.
At some stops Hargai collected payments, counted money, then tucked it into his back pocket. When that got too bulky, the money was shoved into the glove compartment.
Covered buckets of milk were downloaded. At times, Hargai scooped milk with a plastic jug into containers provided by the outlets. While doing so, his hand frequently came in contact with milk. But he was oblivious.
Money here is really filthy as was money in Korea when I was a child. It reminded me of my maternal grandfather who used to wash his dirty bank notes and clip them on a line to dry in his room. I had watched him bemused. Then, a child, bank notes were bank notes. I had no clue how filthy they were. Seeing this milk operation, I suddenly understood my grandpa.
Milk all delivered, we swung by three milk collection points, where milk from villagers were received, weighed and tested as at the factory. Milk found meeting the standards was then poured into a large barrel through a sheet of cotton gauze to catch any impurities.
But, but… how come the plant staff didn’t test the milk she received?
“Lactometer’s broken” Explained Hargai, quite unruffled.
Apparently they had been without a lactometer for a week. They were only available in Arusha some three and a half hours away.
But lactometers don’t cost much. Why doesn’t the plant keep a few extras for moments like this…?
When we returned to the plant later in the morning, Hargai took me on a tour. First, the boiler room at the back. True to its name, a large wood burning stove dominated the room. On it sat a sizeable aluminum urn, perhaps 2 meters in diameter in which water was boiling, bubbling. In the boiling water sat two 50 liter canisters of milk.
“This is how we pasteurize milk,” Hargai said. “They are kept in the boiling water for 20 minutes.”
My eyes wonder around the room, searching for a clock, a timer, anything which might help gauge time but found none.
“How do you know when it’s done?” I asked.
“Oh, we know,” he said without a speck of doubt in his voice. “In fact, these canisters are ready.”
He and his helper stepped up onto a rickety bench beside the urn, swaddled handgrips, put one foot against the rim of the urn for support then heaved them up and onto the floor, one by one. Their neck muscles strained at the weight. One careless move could land them in that bubbling water…. What a horrific thought!
Time to add culture to start fermentation. He gave a packet of culture a good shake, poured the content into the canister and stirred gently. That done, they heaved the canister once more to a far corner of the room and placed it directly under a tap and opened the tap full blast. A ledge, about a foot high, enclosed the area around the tap. Water would be left running over the canister of milk continuousely till it has cooled down. A small hole on the wall at the bottom by the tap let the water drain out directly.
“So you collect the water and use it elsewhere?” I asked. “No we don’t collect,” responded Hargai, puzzled at my question.
“You mean you let all that water to go to waste…?”
An long look at each other, then both us went silent as if to declare a truce….Better not go there.
Hargai rolled a canister of milk which had cooled earlier as he led me to the incubation room. Several large barrels were already parked there to one side. All the barrels looked identical without anything to indicate when they were brought into the room.
“How can you tell which one’s ready?” I asked. “We can,” Hargai replied curtly. I obviously was wearing him out with my unending questions.
Now, the final stop. Here, a long shelf ran along one wall. In the middle of the room sat a woman in white gown and masked; beside her, a table with a machine atop. Within easy reach of her sat a milk barrel open and a box filled with plastic packets. “The packing room,” declared Hargai. “And that’s a sealing machine.
We watched her scoop up mtindi (sour milk) from a large plastic barrel and deftly fill a plastic pouch, seal, then throw it onto the shelf. Once manufacture and expiration dates are stamped on them, the packets would be ready to go.
That was Kondiki Milk Processing Plant nine years ago. Today, it is still small but the plant has undergone dramatic changes from manual operation using boiling water over wood burning stove to a fully automated operation.
Installing modern plant was easy. The biggest challenge lay in the human factor. It was an ordeal to have them leap from the pre-Industrial Revolutions ways to the ways of the 21st century. There were moments when the only sensible option seemed to be to close down the plant and forget about it. That painful sojourn will fill the next month’s column.
The writer (youngkimaro2015@gmail.com) resides on the slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. She worked for the World Bank for nearly 30 years.