Poles prefer to buy Danish than Dutch dairy cattle

Polish buyers more often opt for Danish than Dutch dairy cattle. So says the Polish livestock trading company PHKonrad. Polish farmers pay extra for the high health status and longevity of Danish Holstein heifers.

PHKonrad annually buys several thousand heifers in the Netherlands through intermediaries. An important part of the total annual import of breeding heifers into Poland. This year they expect an increase in the total import of breeding cattle, because the milk price is rising in Poland. The scaling up in the country with the hundreds of thousands of 'backyard farms' is taking enormous leaps in a short time. Some companies suddenly jump from bucket milk to one or more milking robots. This is partly due to the EU investment funds.

With a rising milk price, imports also rise and vice versa. PHKonrad assumes that it will buy more livestock in the Netherlands, because of the much larger supply due to the mandatory reduction of livestock. The Netherlands offers the Poles a relatively low price, but the German market has traditionally been an important purchasing market for the Poles and the Danish market scores best in quality. Not only in terms of health status (IBR and BVD) but also the studbook registration in Denmark is in order, according to PHKonrad. Polish livestock farmers assume that Danish livestock will last longer than Dutch livestock. The confidence that Polish dairy farmers have in Denmark also has to do with pig farming.

Eighty percent of the Polish import of piglets comes from Denmark, while imports from the Netherlands halved in 2016. This is based on the same reasons as in dairy farming, health status (SPF) and longevity (vitality, starting weight). Incidentally, PHKonrad is one of the few Polish livestock trading companies that not only imports piglets from Denmark but also from the Netherlands. On request, PHKonrad also supplies red Holstein cattle from the Netherlands. That sometimes happens, just like there is also a sale for Red Danish cattle and Scandinavian red fur.

In addition to the livestock business, the Polish company also trades breeding bull semen from several world-renowned AI companies such as Semex and Viking Genetics. The company was founded in the 250s and grew to XNUMX Polish employees in XNUMX years. The imported cattle are delivered directly to the customer, but can also be purchased from a number of show stables across Poland.

With a snack and a drink, livestock farmers can select the cattle, which are temporarily cared for and milked in the show stables, if necessary. In the past, these show stables were used as export stables to Russia, but PHKonrad lost the Russian market, even though Poland did not have bluetongue problems like the Netherlands and to a lesser extent Germany and Denmark. 

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