Illustrative Image (Vietnam)HCM City (VNA) – Ho Chi Minh City’s authorities have planned to prioritise competitiveness improvement rather than enlargement of local dairy cow herd in response to upcoming flurry of imports.
Head of the municipal Agriculture and Rural Development Department Nguyen Van Truc was speaking at a meeting with reporters on November 26.
According to Truc, the cattle scale is encouraged to remain at around 100,000 heads. On a daily basis, a local cow produces approximately 16 litres of milk, each of which requires up to 12,000 VND in production cost. The cattle are raised by households at a small scale of between 5 and 20 cows.
As the Trans-Pacific Partnership will soon take effect, New Zealand, the US and Australia – members of the agreement and global leading dairy producers – are expected to increase dairy shipments to Vietnam.
Production costs in these nations, where the animal is mainly bred in ranches, are between 7,000 – 8,500 VND per litre of milk. Each cow is capable of producing 30 litres of milk per day, almost double her peer raised in HCM City.
Thus, the southern hub’s dairy industry is in need of technical measures to improve productivity and quality, as well as cut production cost.
If each local household breeds up to 100 cows, the cost will be reduced to 6,500 VND per litre of milk.
A dairy cow exhibition and contest will be held in Cu Chi district from December 4-6.-VNA
