Online Reporter
Walter Nyamukondiwa
Mashonaland West Bureau Chief
The Chinhoyi University of Technology (CUT) has taken Education 5.0 a notch higher and is now processing 8 000 litres of milk every day into flavoured yoghurt and sour milk while developing herbal-based treatment regimens for conditions such as mastitis.
Already with a pen fattening scheme for beef, an animal feed research and processing unit, poultry, fish and black soldier fly projects, CUT is developing integrated production hubs.
The current milk processing plant can process 8 000 litres of milk per day into various flavoured yoghurts, which are now being sold to schools in Mashonaland West province.
Research is currently underway to infuse indigenous fruit tree flavours to add to the eight flavours already adopted.
Dean in the School of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, Professor Chris Murungweni, said Education 5.0 had reoriented the University towards production and productivity.
Housed under the Dairy Production and Milk Value Addition Centre of Excellence, the unit is now collecting milk from local farmers to complete local production.
“We have 143 cows in our dairy section with 43 currently producing milk while the remaining 100 are either heifers waiting to calve or in-calf,” said Prof Murungweni.
“We have a typical small-scale dairy farm as a training ground for our students to give them practical knowledge on how to run it. Then we have a large-scale farm with a milking unit for up to 24 cows at a time.”
From the milking parlour, milk is transferred to a 2000 or 5000-litre cooling chamber before being taken to processing chambers where culture is added, and milk is pasteurised, depending on the product being produced.
The unit also takes students from other tertiary institutions, apart from CUT students.
Prof Murungweni hailed the Government for introducing Education 5.0 for reshaping the human capital and industrial development trajectory.
“We are now giving them skills and competence, unlike under Education 3.0, where we produced graduates ready to get employment,” he said.
“We have a PhD student who is developing an anti-mastitis drug from indigenous trees as part of heritage-based learning, which draws from what our forefathers used.”
Universities, he said, would soon lead to the realignment of industry performance and culture through competitive pricing based on actual production costs.
This, he said, would lead to price discovery for most products, whose pricing is driven by corporate greed and profiteering.
Prof Murungweni said value chain realignment would be one of the offshoots of Education 5.0 to the benefit of ordinary citizens.
“We still have to fine-tune our distribution systems so that our products are readily available in retail shops,” he said.
Universities, he said, would be significant players on the market through innovation and also complementing existing corporates.
CUT plans to set up a bigger plant once the dairy herd has reached 500 cows, leading to increased milk output.
“We cannot fully utilise the plant as our milk production capacity is low and supplies from local farmers still need to increase. Once that is sorted, we plan to have a bigger plant,” he said.
The University plans to procure a milk separator to produce skimmed milk and cream to make other products such as cheese, ice cream and butter, among others.
It will also help in the development of products with specific fat content.
The Government has positioned universities as hubs for industrial development and tangible products as solutions to social and community needs.
