Monday, February 9, 2009

Big Plans for Heilongjiang Hogs

Heilongjiang Province has lots of fertile land and is a big grain producer, but it's far from markets along the east coast. The province has lots of grain that goes into warehouses and rots. So Heilongjiang officials are always trying to hatch some plan to use up all the grain they produce.

Their latest plan is to become a huge hog production base. They have a new plan to increase hog slaughter to 50 million head by 2012. That's around 9 percent of current national output. They have identified surburban areas of Harbin, Daqing, Mudanjiang, Jiamusi, and 28 other cities and counties for hog development. They will set up regional breeding centers, subsidize loans for dragon head enterprises, set up 7177 large scale hog farms, increase silage output from 9.8 mmt to 19.2 mmt in 5 years, and build facilities to make methane gas from hog waste. The province will carry out disease surveillance, boost credit through loan guarantees, form cooperatives and associations, promote vertical integration, spread technology and improve risk management.

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