10 people from Vietnam, part of the Ministry of Agriculture (including the Vice Minister) and people from the Soc Trang Province came to visit Sommet de l’élevage last week. This trip takes place during the year of the 45th anniversary of Vietnamese-french friendship.

A round table was organized the first afternoon to discuss about the needs of Vietnam in terms especially of livestock development, and in particular for cattle and goats. Vietnam’s dairy industry is growing a lot; they now reach 300 000 dairy cows (they had 40 000 in 2010); most of the cattle is Holstein crossbred.

They are looking for new breeds better adapted to their difficult conditions (temperature, humidity, lack of food..) and looking for help to improve traceability, conservation and transformation of the products.
Thursday afternoon was organized for them a Brown Swiss farm visit by EVOLUTION International and BGS, our national Brown Swiss Breeding program.

We visited GAEC des Cheminées de fée, in Saint Diery, 30 minutes from the fair ; they have there 53 brown swiss cows and transform their milk into AOP Saint Nectaire.

The Vietnamese delegation really enjoyed this visit and the discovery of one of our multiple French breeds showing more hardiness, good options for Vietnam in the future.

The group was even filmed by French television! Click on the video to watch the news, from 11.39 to 13.46 minutes

Finally, on Friday morning, we visited a goat farm at Vou of 600 Alpine goats,SCEA La Moussardière!