THE KOSTANAY REGION PLANS TO EXPORT 2 THOUSAND TONS OF BEEF THIS YEAR

The Kostanay region plans to export about 2 thousand tons of beef by the end of 2018. According to Head of the Livestock Department of the regional Agriculture AdministrationAlibekOrazbayev, there are three 1st level fattening sites working on the program for the development of beef cattle breeding, which have a one-time capacity of 3,000 heads: Terra LLP (Karabalyk district), Karaman and K LLP (Karasu district), and Altynsarino LLP (Kamysty district). All these sites are export-oriented and will start exporting livestock from this year. The representative of the AgricultureAdministration noted that some amendments of the Ministry of Agriculture on the issues of customs documents registration influenced the resumption of export of livestock from fattening sites of the region. “What has been changed in the rules? For today, the Ministry of Agriculture has carried out work to reduce the time required for customs documents. If previously the registration of meat for export took from 7 to 10 days, today this period is reduced to 1-3 days. Thus the work becomes easier for our export-oriented agricultural producers”, A. Orazbayev said.

The state makes a major contribution to the development of meat clusters in the regions in the form of subsidies as well. “State support measures directly affect the growthof export. If previously the state subsidized depending on the weight of the livestock from KZT 45 to 75 thousand, then this year the single standard is KZT 200 per kilogram of gained weight. In other words, the greater the increase in livestock, the more subsidies will be received by farmers. In economic terms, this is a very interesting proposal for agricultural producers”, A. Orazbayevnoted. For example, last year one of the three local fattening sites –Terra LLP– receivedmore than KZT 480 million of state support in the direction of productivity, which was aimed at reducing the cost of fattening bulls.

Today, the journalists had an opportunity to visit this fattening site and get introduced with the whole chain of the export process, starting with customs clearance, weighing of the selected bulls and loading them into special equipment for further transportation to Russian meat processing plants. According to Director of Terra LLP NurbolatKutkozhayev, the farm has been specializing in fattening cattle for export for three years now. The farm is designed for 8,000 heads of lump-sum maintenance: today there are about 6,000 heads, which according to the head of the enterprise, contain Canadian technology, in other words, loose housing. “For today, 6 thousand heads of different breeds are on fattening– Angus, White-headed, Auliekol. There is nondescript cattle, which we buy from the rural population”, the farm director said.

“We began to export livestock in 2016 in Orenburg, to the Orenbeef meat plant. Then the export of livestock was suspended in connection with some restrictions. During this period, we exported only meat to our regular partners in Yekaterinburg, to the Beefstream meat plant, where butchering was carried out and carcasses were exported to Bashkortostan. From today, the export of livestock is resumed”. Terra company plans to export only 300 head of bulls per month to the aforementioned Orenbeef meat plant in Orenburg. “The meat plant is very large with the need for 4,800 heads per month, but we start with 300 heads – it'sabout 68 tons of meat per month. The meat plant is 60 kilometers away from us, so it is convenient for us in the logistics plan”, NurbolatKutkozhayev said.

“In the future, we plan to increase the export of livestock to Russia. Today, the agreement has already been concluded with the Orenbeef meat plant, and the first 60 heads will be exported”. In general, according to the information provided by the representative of the Agriculture Administration, this year in the Kostanay region it is planned to export beef in the volume of 2 thousand tons. By the way, as of May 1, 2018, 170 tons have already been delivered, and it is planned to increase the pace by the fall.