The global camel milk market in relation to other milk markets is quite small. If we think of the cow milk market as the benchmark, then the camel milk market size is almost one hundredth in comparison. According to FAO, the distribution of world milk production is roughly 81% cow milk, 15% buffalo milk, and 4% for goat, sheep, and camel milk combined and it is projected to grow at 1.7% p.a. If we compare the market size, the global cow milk market is estimated around 871 billion USD in 2021 and it is projected to grow by 5% year by year. Comparing to that, the global camel milk market is estimated at around 6.2 to 10 billion according to many different sources. If we take the average in between those values, we can speculate that the camel milk market is around 8 billion USD which is one hundredth compared to the global cow milk market.
The global camel milk market is predicted to grow by 7% year on year basis. But 65% of the growth are expected to come from the Africa and Middle East region. So in the near future we can expect more camel milk farm bringing their products in international market from the Middle East and Africa region.
When it comes to camel milk, the big question that needs to be addressed is, how should camel milk be positioned in the market? In the western countries, where there are constraints to get enough population for large scale commercial dairy, they have been positioning camel milk as cure for some lifestyle or other non communicable diseases i.e., diabetes, autism, high blood pressure, lactose intolerance etc. Many times they are also advertised in the market based on their composition of having less fat, more mineral, more vit. C etc. Broadly we can say that they are placed in the category of medicinal or nutritional supplement. Because of that they are charging even 35 USD/litre for camel milk. In most cases the price doesn’t go below 10 USD/litre. Whereas in the Middle East and Africa region camel milk have been positioned in the market mostly as an alternative to dairy milk. Therefore, we can say that camel milk is directly competing with cow milk in MENA region. That is also another reason the price of camel milk is fixed to 3-5 USD/Litre and the milk is kept on the shelves in the supermarket side by side with cow milk.
Now by making camel milk directly competing with cow milk is a losing game in my opinion. Camels are different animals than cows biologically and physiologically. The physiology of the camels will not support the dairy to be developed on the similar principle of cow dairy. Even we consider only one parameter which is dry period which is almost 12-14 months in camels compared to only 2 months in cows, it is enough for every experienced dairy farmer to understand the economics will not add up to any profit if we keep thinking camel milk to be in the same shelf competing with cow milk. In that case we can think of camel milk belonging to the alternative milk category with sheep, goat or plant based milk. So, how does camel milk stack up compared to the alternative milk market?
We can see that the alternative milk market size is 44.9 billion USD compared to only 8 billion AED of camel milk market size. Also compared to 7% growth year by year of camel milk market, the alternative milk market is expected to grow by 11.2%. Which is more than double compared to the expected growth of cow dairy market. We can expect many cow milk customers to be moving towards alternative milk. In my opinion we need to place the camel milk into the alternative milk section avoiding a direct competition with the cow milk which drags the price down significantly and nullifying the profit margin. We need to place camel milk as an alternative nutritional supplement rather than a mundane cow milk replacer. Because the economics will never add up and the camel milk farmers will not get the expected profit out of it. No matter how innovative or moderen the farming method is, it purely goes down to the biology and physiology of the camel as a different species than the cows.
If we think about the comparison of the pricing of the different alternative milk compared to cow milk, we can see from the upper picture what is the price range of different products. Based on that, we can think on which price range we want to position camel milk and milk products.
We have to understand and appreciate the differences rather than trying to group camels and cows in same category.
