Discover modern farming technology at TH Dairy Farm (Nghia Dan)

(Baonghean) -One day is not enough time to visit all the TH dairy farms, one of the largest in the world and the most modern in Southeast Asia in Nghia Dan district (Nghe An), so we only chose to visit some places such as: dairy farm No. 2; Milking center; feed center; clean water factory; wastewater treatment plant and raw material fields... Mr. Gil Inbar - General Director of the farm agreed with that plan and directly guided the group...

Dairy farm No. 2 is located opposite the office area of ​​TH Milk Joint Stock Company, so it is quite convenient for experts and staff of TH farm to travel. This is one of the first constructions of TH in Nghia Dan. Here, cows live in surrounding barns that are carefully managed and protected. The barn system is high, clean and air-conditioned by large fans installed in the barn area. Mr. Gil Inbar - General Director of the farm said: "To help cows adapt to the harsh weather conditions in Nghe An, TH has applied cow raising technology from Israel - also a country with a hot climate (even hotter than in Vietnam - summer temperatures reach over 45oC).

The highlight of this technology is the modern barn design that ensures the best construction standards and creates the most comfortable conditions for the cows. The barn is made of galvanized steel structure, open barn with roof, the barn roof uses 3-layer anti-radiation corrugated iron, the barn floor is made of soil mixed with sawdust, 15cm thick sugarcane bagasse as a cushion for the cows to lie on, both comfortable and limiting hoof inflammation. It is known that TH currently has 2 farm clusters (each farm has 2-3 farms) with a total of 5 farms (each farm has nearly 2,000 dairy cows, more than 3,000 heifers, calves) and the total number of cows at the farm is currently nearly 23,000. In the coming time, TH will continue to import 10,000 more cows from Canada, together with the number of new calves born at the farm, which will increase the total number of cows of TH to 45,000 by 2013.

Dairy Farm No. 1

The next destination is the milking center located not far from the farm. Here, the milking is operated automatically and managed by computer using Afimilk - Israel technology (SAE Afikim Company). The milking system is fully automatic with a capacity of 120 cows/time (3 times/day) and about 5-7 minutes per milking. The cows imported from New Zealand and Australia give an average of more than 40 liters of milk/day and the highest milking is over 52 liters/day (continuously for about 15 consecutive days).

With this modern technology, cow's milk is squeezed through specialized filter cups that will be completely filtered at 37oC and then go through a cooling system to enter a large tank with a temperature of 3-4oC, which is the most optimal storage temperature. The milk is transferred to refrigerated tank trucks and immediately arrives at the processing and packaging plant in Hung Yen. The staff in charge of the milking center said that currently, the milking centers are operating at full capacity and milk more than 200 tons of fresh milk each day.

Cow milking center

Because of careful calculations, at the TH dairy farm, the source of clean water for the cows is very abundant from exploiting the surface water of the Sao River. Due to the very strict requirements for pure drinking water for the cows, TH has invested in building a clean water factory using Amiad technology (Israel). According to the process, raw water is pumped from the Sao River through 16 filter tanks, with a high-pressure sand filter system, waste will be returned to the outside, the rest continues to follow the fine filtration process with a capacity of 160m3/hour, the entire chain reaches 3,000 m3 of water/day. From the clean water factory, through the daily water pipeline system, water flows to the farms for the cows to drink (the cows just need to rub their mouths on the valve system and clean water will automatically flow out). It is known that in order for dairy cows to minimize common intestinal diseases, the drinking water source for cows must be pure because using clean water not only helps the cows stay healthy but also gives high milk yield with good milk quality.

Producing food for dairy cows is still a matter of great concern to TH, because in the past, most of the feed for cows was imported from the US and at the price of 260 USD/ton of hay, it was not only very costly, but also a waste of fertile land in Nghia Dan. Being proactive in providing feed for cows by using domestic and local materials will save 90% of import costs. Therefore, TH decided to invest in a feed processing complex and it has now been completed and put into operation.

Holding an important position in the dairy cow feed processing complex is the 15 m2 attic on the 2nd floor of the complex. This is the control center with a main computer and a networked control panel and a computer system to the feed grinding and mixing silos... Every day, there will be 50 batches of feed with an output of 10 tons/batch, supplying to the cow farms. After being mixed with the ratios automatically measured by the computer, the feed will be transported by specialized vehicles to each farm.

Mr. Hanal - Director of the feed center introduced in great detail about the feed rations for cows: "TH farm's cows are divided into different groups of cows, from newborn calves, young cows to milking cows. Each different type of cow will have each type of best feed rations, built on the knowledge and experience of leading experts. Currently, we produce hundreds of tons of TMR feed every day for different groups of cows. The feed center has many workers and we work 24 hours a day throughout the year. The entire feed center is managed under the control of computers and control software located at the control center. We monitor the data of goods and inventory imported and exported continuously, and can check what we have planned in advance. I think the key factor in providing the best feed for cows is to have enough good grass. The first ingredient needed is silage (including grass mombassa, corn, sorghum, rice straw). As you can see, here we have a lot of silage areas with raw materials produced by TH's farming department in Vietnam. Silage is the key to producing good quality milk."

Automatic irrigation system for corn and sunflower fields for cow feed

Mr. Nguyen Le Thang - crop manager said: "With the determination to self-supply more than 95% of the food source for dairy cows, TH has planned to invest in a large raw material area of ​​more than 8,000 hectares to grow mombasa grass, sorghum, corn... These crop varieties for cows are mainly imported from the US, giving high productivity and quality. The sowing, care and harvesting stages are also fully automated". By investing in modern equipment such as irrigation systems, spraying pesticides, nitrogen fertilizers... on an area of ​​hundreds of hectares. Harvesting is carried out by cutting machines and large trucks, 1 ton is harvested in 10 minutes.

It is expected that in 2012, TH will harvest a total of over 50,000 tons of grass, corn and sorghum. With strong investment in the field of developing raw material areas and processing feed, TH has now produced 85% of its own feed for its cows. It is known that Mr. Le Khac Cuong - Deputy Director in charge of agriculture of the farm is currently in the US to attend a training course on growing and processing feed for dairy cows.

Currently, TH farm is directly managed by 2 multinational companies: Afikim Company of Israel for cattle management and Totally Vets Company of New Zealand for veterinary management and currently has more than 900 foreign experts, staff, of which more than 650 are children of Nghia Dan land. With a dynamic working environment, Vietnamese staff, workers and employees have quickly approached and gradually mastered high technology. And currently, in some important ministries held by Vietnamese people, many of whom are children of Nghe An homeland...

One day is too little time to explore the TH dairy farm, but what we have "heard and seen" has really convinced us. Surely, anyone who comes to the TH farm will have a good impression of this breakthrough investment model in high technology. And what is even more exciting for TH is that the fresh milk product TH true Milk has been welcomed and loved by consumers and is gradually affirming its No. 1 position in the Vietnamese milk market!

The dairy farm project in Nghia Dan (Nghe An) is invested by TH Group; North Asia Commercial Joint Stock Bank is the financial investment consultant with a total investment of 1.2 billion USD. Of which, phase 1 is 350 million USD with a total herd of 45,000 cows, of which more than 20,000 are lactating, along with a modern milk processing plant with a capacity of 500 tons/day. By 2017, the project is expected to have 137,000 cows and the processing plant will reach a capacity of 500 million liters/year.

Hoang Vinh