Interpretive Summary: Cow milk production, consumption, marketing, and food safety constraints in Ethiopia: a systematic review

By: Fana Shiferaw

Implications:

Increasing milk production is essential to meet the nutritional needs of children, with a focus on overcoming challenges such as feed scarcity, limited veterinary services, and low productivity of dairy cattle in Ethiopia.
Enhancing milk marketing systems, including better infrastructure, improved market access, and formalizing milk channels, is key to ensuring that milk reaches households, especially in rural areas, in a timely and efficient manner.
Promoting food safety practices, such as proper milk handling, hygiene, and pasteurization, is crucial to reduce microbial contamination and ensure the safety of milk consumed by children.
Improving consumer awareness and access to safe, high-quality milk through education and better market regulation can help increase milk consumption and reduce the risks associated with unsafe milk handling in both rural and urban areas.

Introduction

In 2023, approximately 48.6 million children aged 0 to 14 lived in Ethiopia (UNICEF Ethiopia Annual Report, 2023). While Ethiopia produces about 12 billion liters of milk annually (Ministry of Agriculture, 2025), this is insufficient to meet the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) recommendation of 200 kg dairy per person per year, requiring over 9.7 billion liters annually just for children. The current intake is only 11% of this target (Farrell, 2021). Dairy consumption among children aged 6 to 23 months declined from 38.9% in 2016 to 14% in 2019 (Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey, 2016; Ethiopian Mini Demographic and Health Survey, 2019).

Malnutrition is a major public health concern in Ethiopia, contributing to 57% of under-five deaths and affecting 37% of children under five with stunting, including 12% severe stunting and a significant proportion with wasting (Girma & Genebo, 2002; Ethiopian Mini Demographic and Health Survey, 2019; Yirga et al., 2019; Raru et al., 2022; Global Nutrition Report, 2024; Mekonen et al., 2024).