Angus had us in Hoh Hot to see the centre of milk production in China. It turned out to be the centre geographically so it was where most of the milk processing plants are located. Fresh milk is not common in China with UHT being the mainstay of production.
After the melamine scandal, China's milk industry will take decades to recover, although the current government seems committed to elevating milk consumption. It would be unfair to make too many assumptions with the limited number of dairies I visited in the area, however, I was not struck by the viability of its herds. One company had a bounty, of sorts, on heifers offering to pay high prices over a three year term with interest in order to get their herd numbers up. We were shown before and after photos of these animals with an obvious improvement in their condition once they came under their care. There was no open grazing there. Instead, it is mainly a feedlot set up with a lot of corn grown in and around these dairies. Ed Cox (one of our Nuffield dairy farmers) was excited to see a line up of a dozen Claas silage harvesters owned by one dairy company. They manage the harvest of their silage, contracting out the growing of it to local farmers. One dairy we visited was all but abandoned after a foot and mouth outbreak.
No comments:
Post a Comment