Hanoi is now one of the 10 biggest producers of cattle and poultry in Vietnam with 1.42 million pigs, over 23 million fowls and waterfowls, and nearly 160,000 cows and buffaloes.
In 2013, livestock production value accounted for 52.1 percent of agricultural production value. Breeding quality plays a decisive role in husbandry development.
From cattle improvement
Before 2009, Hanoi had 7,000 milk cows. A cow produced less than 4,000 litres of milk in a cycle (305 days) because of low-quality breeds. Less than 35 percent of the herd was Holstein Friesian HFF3 cows and over 60 percent was HFF1 and HFF2 cows. Less than 5 percent of cows were purebred. But, the city has carried out a lot of cow breed supporting policies in order to raise the productivity in the past five years. To date, the quantity and quality of dairy cows have been significantly improved. With a herd of over 13,000 heads, HFF3 cows accounted for over 65 percent and purebred cows made up over 10 percent. Current average milk yield is 4.5 tonnes a cycle.
The quality of meat cows has also been enhanced after the city introduced Droughmater, Brahman, BBB (Blanc – Blue – Belgium) and Angus cows. To encourage farmers to raise these breeds, the city has provided free hybridised artificial insemination (AI). Hanoi also increased information and knowledge for farmers and trained AI experts to carry out AI on cows. So far, a majority of farmers have applied AI methods to cows. In 2013 alone, nearly 20,000 high-quality crossbred calves were born, with much higher economic effect than the old breeding method.
In the pig husbandry, farmers previously mainly used local breeds although feed conversion ratio was high and carcass quality was low. In the past five years, the city has focused on improving and developing lean pig and supporting farms to adopt advanced technologies. So far, the quality of pig breeds has been raised, with a total of 153,700 sows. Exotic breeds like Pidu, Pietrain, Duroc, Yorkshire and Landrace are more productive while their quality is substantially higher. Some well-reputed pig breeding farms in Hanoi like a farm run by Nguyen Dac Cu in Son Tay district or by Nguyen Van Thanh in Ung Hoa district are supplying piglets for farmers in the city and in surrounding localities.
To higher-quality poultry breeds
In fowl and waterfowl husbandry, the city has increased the farming scale of high-quality, productive stocks while maintaining high-quality locally pure breeds like Ri chicken, Mia chicken and Co ducks. Exotic chicken breeds are mainly reproductive. Hatcheries can now supply 54,70,298 heads a year. Foreign-run hatcheries now keep 96,000 parent fowls, locally run hatcheries raise 349,000 heads, farms tend 64,000 heads, and households breed 64,300 heads. From 2012, Hanoi introduced Dominant Patridge (commonly known as D300) chicken of Czech Republic, which is known for both good egg and meat output. Nguyen Tich Phuong in Chuong My district is known to many people after he supply D300 chicken. Waterfowls are raised in large scales in some districts like Phu Xuyen and Thuong Tin. Currently, the city has 12,780 breeding waterfowls and supplies 700,000 waterfowl breeds a year for 31 provinces and cities.
In the past five years, Hanoi has organised a lot of training courses for farmers to teach AI techniques. However, livestock quality improvement has confronted a lot of difficulties and challenges because of insufficient care and support of authorities in some localities. For the time being, smallholding farming contributes over 60 percent of output while product prices, feed prices and breed prices are volatile.
To raise the efficiency of livestock breeding development, the city will pilot new breeding techniques and introduce new species like Charolais, Angus and Lymousine cows. As for swine and poultry development, Hanoi will concentrate on keeping indigenous breeds with economic efficiency. The city will build specialised breeding localities to supply the demand of the city and the country. It will build brand names for high-quality species to sustain development and efficiency.
Đăng ký: VietNam News
