July 7, 2015
China to build world's largest dairy site
China has begun work on the construction of a 100,000-head dairy site to supply Russia with milk and cheese.
The site in Mudanjiang City, north-east China, is the world's largest and marks a US$160 million collaboration between Russian and Chinese investors.
China's Zhongding Dairy Farming and Russia's Severny Bur are behind the project.
Currently the world's largest site is also in China- the 40,000-head Modern Dairy Company unit.
Feed and forage stocks for the cattle will be grown on 100,000 ha of land, mostly in Russia. A further 200,000 ha of farmland has been set aside to supply feed once the project is underway.
The construction follows the extended Russian ban on Western dairy imports.
Mansel Raymond, chairman of Milk Working Party Copa-Cogeca, the umbrella organisation for European agricultural groups, said the ban and the Sino-Russian dairy venture sent a worrying signal to EU dairy farmers.
Raymond said that the new site alone could produce 800 million litres of milk per year, equivalent to 100,000 tonnes of cheese- about 30% of Europe's previous exports to Russia.