Dairy products have always been in demand in our country.

It is impossible to imagine either a festive or daily table without them.

Therefore, many private entrepreneurs, when choosing a field of activity for themselves, prefer breeding as a business.

The profitability of such a business is irrefutable, especially as modern technologies for genetically modifying foods are developing, making it difficult for people to find quality products.

If you provide the consumer with a quality product, very soon the manufacturer will have a good reputation, many regular customers, and the business will progress successfully.

Since the market constantly demands fresh and high-quality dairy products, it makes sense to start breeding as a business.

Whether or not it is profitable to grow them for milk can be understood if you look a little at the numbers.

Statistics show that if you maintain a farm of cows to produce milk, the annual profit is about one million six hundred thousand rubles.

Breeding bulls for meat will bring one million three hundred thousand rubles a year. Another opportunity to earn money from keeping cows is to sell manure as soil fertilizer. It can be purchased in large quantities by farmers who grow crops in their fields. Thus, all funds spent on business promotion will be returned in one to two years.

The expected milk market is predominantly located in:

• Production workshops for the production of dairy products such as cheeses, kefirs and butters.
• Large markets that always need a huge amount of fresh produce.
• The counters are small in size, which are located in towns, villages and on the outskirts of the city.

Also, when starting a dairy business, you should consider competition. To avoid many problems later, it is better to immediately choose sales points and a place to build a farm where there are no similar enterprises nearby.

Starting capital amount

The initial capital for opening a dairy business will depend on how many livestock the farmer plans to keep. This determines the size of the premises, the purchase of food, and the hiring of full-time employees.

In total, costs could be as follows:

• For the construction or reconstruction of a premises, up to two hundred thousand rubles may be needed.
• To purchase livestock you will need about three hundred thousand rubles (if you buy seven or eight).
• To complete all the documentation for running a business you need about twenty thousand rubles.

As a result, you will need approximately five hundred or six hundred thousand rubles, depending on the number of livestock.

Annual expenses while doing business will be:

• Three hundred sixty thousand rubles for renting the premises (if it is your own, part of the money will go to pay utilities and other taxes).
• Sixty-five thousand rubles for the purchase of feed.
• Five hundred forty thousand rubles for the payment of regular wages to full-time employees.
• One hundred thousand rubles to pay off state taxes.
• About one hundred thousand rubles for other expenses, such as purchasing and maintaining equipment and treating animals.

Consequently, to maintain about a dozen cows, more than one million rubles will be required per year. If the business develops well, the owner may want to increase the number of livestock. In this case, expenses will increase, but income will also increase.

The state may cover a certain portion of the costs of organizing a new business. If you are familiar with the laws and rights, you can contact some services and authorities to receive subsidies for the purchase of livestock and buildings for their breeding, as well as for the purchase of feed. However, this option is not always available. Check with local government development agencies for details.

Where to start business development

Breeding cows as a business is not such a simple matter. Where to begin? The development of any business should begin with collecting information in this area.

First of all, you need to know everything about the following topics:

• Types of cows for milk and meat, their advantages.
• Features of keeping cows of the selected breed.
• The nuances of raising livestock at different times of the year, their reaction to rising and falling temperatures, different humidity.
• Opportunities for selling milk, meat products and manure. Learn about exchange and wholesale options.

Selection of cows for breeding

When choosing a cow breed and purchasing a herd for breeding for milk, you need to pay attention to the following factors:

• Growth rate of young heifers.
• Large size and weight of animals when they grow up.
• Good health of all individuals in the herd.
• High level of animal performance.
• The ability of cows to produce one healthy one each year.
• The ability of cows to produce large quantities of milk for many years in a row.
• Good adaptability of livestock to different climatic conditions and the ability to quickly adapt to changes.

Cows that meet the above requirements are distinguished by the following description:

• The abdominal area of ​​the cow's body has a barrel shape, a round belly, and a thin, but highly durable, skeleton. This indicates that the animal’s food digestion system and lungs are working well.
• The shape of the head is elongated, it is light in weight. The horns are small and not wide. The withers are not sharp and not forked. The line of the back is straight, without unnecessary bends.
• The udder is large in size and weight. It has a sparse and soft hair covering. Its volume becomes significantly smaller after milking, and soft and elastic folds appear at the back of the udder. The highest yielding udders are bowl or tub shaped.
• The first third of a cow's lactation period is considered the most productive. The closer the end of this period is, the less milk it produces. When a cow is no longer young, she is less productive. Usually the amount of milk increases until the seventh lactation, after which it begins to gradually decrease.

Farm arrangement

The old building can be purchased or rented. When choosing, you should pay attention to the following features:

• To maintain a herd of ten individuals, a room measuring about 34 x 6 m is required. If the herd is small, the animals can be kept inside stalls. Their average size can be equal to two square meters.
• It is advisable to locate the farm in an area where there are many fields for growing crops. This will allow you to quickly find buyers for manure and transport it without difficulty.
• In order for the cows to be healthy and the milk to be of high quality, there must be a meadow for grazing animals near the buildings for their maintenance. Lush greens are an important element of the feed, and getting them from free natural resources can save money.
• The stall must have a drain and a door for manure.

If a farm with a population of several hundred cows is planned, grazing on the meadows will be unlikely, and all feed will be distributed using special machines directly inside the farm. In this case, the specifics of the area may be different: a building for keeping a herd and storing feed will take up more space, and the presence of a meadow nearby is not so important.

Catering and animal care

The diet of cows should include the following ingredients:

• Compound feed.
• Dried grass.
• Fresh greens.

It is also necessary to add all kinds of vitamin supplements to the food. The food should be varied and nutritious so that the animals do not lose weight and produce a lot of milk.

According to statistics, for one cow per day it is necessary to spend from nine to fifteen kilograms of hay. But this figure may vary depending on the season and climatic conditions. When a herd grazes in a meadow, it will consume much less food while in the stall. However, in winter, animals have a considerable appetite, so you should calculate in advance the amount of hay and feed that you need to stock up on so that the herd is well-fed and productive.

Many years of experience show that cattle breeding will be effective if you choose the right breed of animals, taking into account climatic conditions, and organize good care. Otherwise, productivity is significantly reduced, the development of young animals is delayed, and its production function is disrupted.

Where to begin

Today, cattle breeding is a promising activity, especially for rural areas. First of all, you need to clearly define the task: obtaining milk, meat or young animals for the purpose of subsequent sale.

When making a choice, you should definitely pay attention to certain features of each type:

• sufficient growth rate;
• reproductive ability;
• ease of acclimatization;
• high milk yield is an important indicator for dairy breeds;
• final mass indicator.

The next step is to select a location for the future farm and start building it after receiving all the appropriate permits. As an option, you can rent an area with abandoned buildings, which, after restoration and equipping with the necessary equipment, will become suitable for use.

For a large enterprise you will need the following equipment:

• special heaters;
• feed supply devices;
• dispensers and milking machines;
• devices for cleaning manure.

In order for everything to function properly, you should take care of communications in advance: electricity, heating, water supply and sewerage systems. The optimal size of the room is selected depending on the planned number of animals.

In case there is no veterinarian nearby, the farm owner should always have an emergency first aid kit with the most necessary drugs and tools on hand.

After establishing the production process, you need to determine possible options for selling the products: the nearest processing plants, restaurants, shops, market.

Important! For efficient organization of production, it is very important to have a powerful feed base. Good weight gain is facilitated by seasonal grazing in a meadow with a sufficient amount of grass and the use of feed additives: compound feed, beets, macadamia, grain crops, silage. It is equally important to ensure timely delivery and supply of fresh water.

How to choose the right breed

The positive result of the planned enterprise directly depends on how competently all the nuances are calculated: the acquisition of animals, their maintenance, catering, personnel selection, execution of permits.

Today there are many breeds of livestock, the main task is to choose the most suitable option:

1. distributed throughout the world. Perfectly acclimatizes to any conditions. It has a red color with white spots. It grows quickly and has good reproductive abilities. At one and a half years it reaches optimal development.
2. The breed was bred in Scotland and is suitable for breeding in many countries, including the Russian Federation. It acclimatizes well in different geographical zones. It is distinguished by its compact build and early maturity.
3. Charolais grows intensively for two years. It has a light color: from white to yellow. Endowed with a well-formed, strong body, of a pronounced meat type.
4. The Limousin breed has a red coat. The animals are hardy, easy to care for, and have high fertility.
5. The Salers breed is easy to keep. They gained popularity due to their unique fertility - each cow annually produces a calf. Universal - used for the production of meat and milk. Adapts perfectly in difficult climatic conditions.
6. distinguished by a red color, sometimes with white markings. It quickly gains weight and maintains it, despite periods of drought or long wintering. Widely distributed throughout the Russian Federation.
7. breed. In summer, the animal has short, smooth hair, which grows strongly by winter, becoming a thick, sometimes curly coat. Gaining weight quickly.
8. – The most common meat in the world is a dairy breed. This species produces not only high-quality beef, but also raw materials for leather production. Maintenance is cost-effective – profitability reaches 95%.

Whatever type of animal is chosen, productivity will depend on properly organized housing conditions: a warm (not lower than 17 ° C), draft-free room, equipping each stall with a feeder with a sufficient amount of high-quality feed and a drinking bowl with fresh water, manure is cleaned daily, which will ensure compliance with sanitary standards.

Animal weight gain should be determined monthly using large scales or modern devices that are highly accurate.

Production Features

Livestock farming has never lost its relevance, and today, with the advent of food products of questionable quality, it is gaining particular popularity. Raising cattle is painstaking work that requires financial investment, patience and organizational skills. For full operation, the following staff will be required:

• competent leader;
• milkmaids are needed on dairy farms;
• a veterinarian who will give vaccinations, assist with childbirth and treat various diseases;
• A full-time butcher is useful only on a large farm.

For a large enterprise, an appropriate solution would be to purchase a vehicle for transporting products.

You need to buy young animals in the presence of an experienced breeder or veterinarian. After all, only a specialist can judge the health of livestock by their eyes, teeth, gait and other indicators.

The climatic conditions of the region in which cattle will be raised play an important role in the successful implementation of the project. It is important to remember that the main goal of any enterprise is the use of technologies that allow obtaining maximum results with minimal financial costs. Any beginner or experienced herder has the right to choose the most suitable method for himself.

Breeding cattle (cattle) is one of the most ancient human activities. Today, like hundreds of years ago, it can become profitable and bring in good income if you approach it wisely. It is no coincidence that the people have always called the cow “nurse”.

The cattle breeding business involves working not only with cows, but also with buffalos, yaks, etc., however, in Russia it is more profitable and more common to breed cows and bulls. Their meat and dairy products will be easier to sell.

Where should you start?

When dealing with cows, you will have to regularly resort to the services of a veterinarian, even if the livestock is completely healthy. According to Russian legislation, there are a number of mandatory annual vaccinations against some severe or rapidly spreading diseases: mad cow disease, rhinotracheitis, viral diarrhea, leptospirosis, and so on.

In addition, the veterinarian will issue health certificates for the animals, which will be needed to sell meat and milk. So, get to know the veterinarian you will see regularly. Next, you need to calculate the initial investment and start purchasing.

When purchasing cattle, be sure to ask for a certificate from a veterinarian that each animal is healthy.

Construction of a cowshed

First you need to build a barn. It must be a thoughtful, well-planned building. The barn should be warm. This does not mean that it must be heated, far from it. The main thing is that there are no cracks and holes that result in drafts.

In temperate and northern latitudes, winters can be very frosty. If you want to get maximum milk yield and growth, it is better to provide heating during this period, at least in the calf barn. Most cows hatch in the spring, coming out into the herd after wintering, so calving usually occurs in the winter months.

The room should have windows that open, as good lighting and adequate ventilation are required in the warm season. It is necessary to make a wide entrance. When a cow is in position, her sides become very wide. In addition, it sways when walking, so the optimal opening width is 1.5 m.

The barn can be simple or automated, but in any case it must be warm and contain running water, sewer drains, and separate stalls with feeders and drinkers.

Next, you need to provide drain channels for liquid drainage. The general drain should extend beyond the barn; do it on a slope. If you don’t want a heavy odor, install concrete cesspools with hatches. Each unit of cattle must have its own place with a feed sector and a drinking bowl. It is advisable to separate the stalls with a structure made of welded pipes, since cows are not always friendly to each other, and we do not need fights in the barn.

Purchase of livestock

This is a very important stage in setting up a farm: the profitability of your business will depend on what cows and bulls you buy. In Russia there are both purebred animals and half-breeds, often with inbreeding. It is useless to expect large milk yields and weight gain from such specimens. It is better to purchase animals from nurseries or large farms, where the purity of the breed is closely monitored.

When purchasing cattle, there are two options: buy adult (but not old) cows or buy young cattle and raise them yourself. The second option is fraught with great risk, since not every heifer subsequently becomes a good dairy or beef cow. In addition, you will have to wait at least a year for results.

When selling cattle, they may slip you an old cow. The life expectancy of cows is 16-20 years. At the same time, a large amount of milk with good care can only be obtained between the ages of 3 and 13 years. During her life, a cow can have 11-12 calvings. Calves are born annually. Gestation period is 9 months.

A cow produces the maximum amount of milk at the age of 4-8 years, starting from the 3rd calving. Milk appears after the first calving. It is more profitable and reliable to take young cows that have already calved at least once.

After a cow stops calving, her milk disappears and she becomes useless in terms of producing products. Such pensioners are sent to sausage, since their meat is already quite tough. To avoid buying an old cow, pay attention to its horns. Every year a new rim appears on them. They can be seen by their shape and different shades. If there are a lot of rims, then the cow is no longer young. The optimal number is 3-6 pieces, no more.

Investment size

Investments, like the farm itself, can be different. This depends on the number and pedigree of the livestock, the size and degree of automation of the barn, the availability of an agricultural base for growing feed and many other nuances. To have an idea of ​​investing in cattle breeding, let’s take a certain type of farm, with an initial quantity of 10 heads with fully purchased feed (without own cultivation).

The cost of a young dairy cow varies from 30,000 rubles to 50,000 € (Dutch dairy breeds). If you purchase from Russian nurseries, the average price is 50,000 rubles. Thus, we will need 500,000 rubles to buy cows. Feed purchases also vary depending on the time of year. In winter, in addition to feed, you will need hay. In autumn, feed can be replaced with vegetables and fruits.

On average, one cow needs a bucket of vegetables or 1/3 of a bucket of fertilizer when walking on pasture. If the grass is lush and grows abundantly, fertilizing can be halved. The cost of building a barn depends on the selected building materials, the nuances of architecture and interior design. For the first time, you can get by with a small building.

So, in total, you will have to pay at least 1,000,000 rubles for the barn, cows and initial feed. Let's add to this inventory and wages for employees who will need an advance in the first month.

Step-by-step instruction

So, having decided to choose cattle breeding as your business, be patient and hardworking. Working with animals requires a reasonable attitude and self-confidence. Even if you have only seen cows on TV or on the way to a picnic, this craft can be learned fairly quickly. To get started you will need:

• Cowshed.
• Animals.
• Basic equipment: vegetable cutter, grain crusher, separator, milking machines.
• Stern.
• Inventory (buckets, flasks).
• Inspection of livestock by a veterinarian.
• Registration with the administration of the rural settlement.
• Opening an individual entrepreneur or farming.
• Hired workers.

As you can see, there is nothing complicated. If you buy cattle already at productive age, you can make a profit almost immediately by selling dairy products.

Sales of products

The first products from cows have been received, it’s time to think about how to sell them. There are many types of cattle products. Here you need to decide what is more profitable. To produce each product you will need your own small production facility or certain equipment. For example, to make cream and cottage cheese from milk, you will need a separator. To make stew, you need a canning line.

You can start by selling milk and meat in their pure form, if the capital is not too large. It's not as profitable, but it requires less investment. Processing facilities can be equipped later. Product sales methods:

1. City or village market.
2. Catering establishments.
3. The shops.
4. Own retail outlets.
5. Dairies, meat processing plants.
6. Institutions and enterprises using meat and dairy products.

Each of these methods has its pros and cons. For different types of sales, certain additional expense items will be required, as well as special paperwork. For example, to sell in your own stall or store, you will have to open it with a full set of documents and change the tax reporting form accordingly. As a farmer or individual entrepreneur, you will no longer qualify for the simplified taxation system.

To sell products, certificates from a veterinarian and a laboratory report on the quality and suitability of dairy and meat products are required.

The easiest way is to hand over milk or meat to factories. All you need is a certificate of health of the animal. Laboratory studies of product quality are carried out at the enterprises themselves. The cost of sales will be several times less than with other sales methods, but you can deliver any amount of milk and meat to the enterprise.

The choice of location for your farm should be informed. It is necessary that there be convenient transport connections, that is, places for selling meat and dairy products are nearby and easily accessible. Otherwise, it is necessary to purchase special equipment with a refrigerator, since the products are perishable. For customers to like your products, they must be exceptionally fresh.

As mentioned earlier, it is necessary to have a veterinary service nearby. Calling a doctor from afar will incur additional costs. In addition, if livestock gets sick, their help may be late. There should be an equipped cattle burial ground within a radius of 10 km. An important aspect is the presence of meadows and ponds in the selected area so that the animals can eat and drink to their heart’s content.

As a rule, all these conditions are created in medium and large villages of regional centers, where the local population is engaged in cattle breeding. There is also a common herd where you can drive your own livestock. There is no point in setting up a farm on the outskirts of the city. There will be problems with grazing, polluted environment (greatly affects the health of cows) and residents of neighboring houses.

Documentation

Opening the status of an individual entrepreneur or farmer at the stage of setting up a farm is unprofitable, since there is no profit yet. The exception is cases with the use of subsidies from the state:

• To open a small business for cattle breeding. A one-time payment of 60,000 rubles is given and the same amount for each registered employee. You need to provide a business plan and have a ready-made barn.
• To support farming. Up to 1,500,000 rubles are issued depending on the volume of an existing agricultural enterprise or when starting a farm.

In the first 12 months, with income not exceeding 40,000 rubles, you do not need to pay tax. The tax liability is considered “deferred” in accordance with Art. 256 (clause 1) of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation.

When registering any of these small business statuses, at the first stage it is more advisable to switch to a simplified form of taxation.

With the further development of business, processing plants and trading enterprises will be added to cattle breeding. Tax reporting will be slightly different. This can be the Unified Agricultural Tax (UAT) or the simplified tax system (income minus expenses).

Cattle farming involves the reproduction of offspring, which are primarily used in the beef market. Naturally, this is done in order to get more cows that will produce calves that can be sold for meat or to replenish the herd.

Steps

Buy a herd of cows and/or a bull. Buy good cows that meet the standards, the reproduction of the herd depends on this.

• Your bull should be selected to improve the herd as he will provide half the genetic potential of your future calves. Knowing this point will really help determine how good a bull the herd needs. Fertility and calf survival are key to profitability. One live calf is worth more than 100 dead ones. A large bull that sires larger calves than your cow can safely give birth to is economic suicide.

1. Select a breeding program. There are two types to choose from and both can be integrated into the other if you so choose.

   • If your herd is too small to support a bull, or you don't want to deal with bulls properly, you can use artificial insemination to breed your herd.
   • If you have a herd of 10 or more cows and don't want to resort to artificial insemination, then it's a matter of getting a good bull for the entire herd. The rule of thumb is 1 bull per 25 cows. Fertile bulls with high libido can serve 50 cows without compromising quality. Bulls reach their peak fertility at 20 months of age, after the 20th month it can only fall; Barring illness or injury, with proper nutrition, most bulls do not decline in fertility until 6-7 years of age.

2. Raise your own cattle. Know when your cows come into heat, when they are ready to breed, and when they come out of heat.

   • If you use a bull for your herd, then you don't have to worry about when your cows go into heat, only when they have been bred.
   • Follow the steps in How to Artificially Inseminate Cows and Heifers to know how and when to artificially inseminate your females. .

3. Monitor your bulls and cows during the breeding season. If you have too many bulls for your herd, then there may be more fighting between bulls than matings.

   • Running bull[s] under 4 years of age with older bull[s] may prevent cows from being served by the bull with the highest fertility. In the meantime, you can finish off a bull that has a broken penis, an injured leg/hoof, or just isn't doing the job.
   • Also watch the cows. If you see cows' tails stretched out or curled as they walk, it means they were fertilized in the intervening 24 to 48 hours before you first noticed this physical sign.

4. 64-85 days after launching the bull[s], remove them. If you are not going to breed cows all year round so that the bulls are constantly interacting with the cows, then remove the bulls after 2-3 months of being with the cows, during which time all your cows will get 3-4 opportunities to be impregnated, and also not so long for your less fertile cows so they can escape the bull's service.

• The optimal bull to cow ratio is 1 bull to 10 – 30 cows, depending on pasture size and bull age, variety/libido and experience.
  • Some bulls, depending on the cow's birth rate and how many cows are in heat, can handle more than 50 cows in one season.
• Cows should be bred 45-80 days after they calve, depending on age and condition.
• The maximum results of artificial insemination are achieved on virgin heifers. The choice of bull to mate with heifers is an important factor for fertility. In vitro fertilization companies offer a wide range of options. Artificially inseminating your heifers will be 3 weeks before the bull(s) are released to the herd, so most of your heifers will have extra time to recover from the stress of calving before being re-breeding the next breeding season.
• Assess cows and heifers 30 days before breeding season. They must be within a Cdn BCS of 2.5 to 3 to be ready to breed. Heifers must be within a Cdn BCS of 3 to 3.5 to be ready for breeding. If the rates are lower or higher, it will reduce the fertility rates in your herd.
  • Bulls must be Cdn BCS 3 to 3.5 to be able, have the energy and strength to breed during the final breeding season. He will pay more attention to his girls than to food.
• For optimal breeding, have your bull[s] semen tested before he mates with cows. This will ensure that he/they will be able to serve your cows without any problems regarding fertility or possible injury.
• It is often better to hire an in vitro fertilization technician to do the work for you. This is because if you have someone with more experience in insemination techniques for your cattle, the success rate should be higher and worth the extra expense than if you did it yourself.
• Use purebred bulls to mate with cows to produce higher quality calves in commercial cow-calf operations.
  • You can also cross one breed with another to produce calves that display heterosis or hybrid power. For example, mating an Angus bull to a Hereford cow will give you black hairless calves that have both characteristics of their sires and dams. If you follow the Angus gene pool program, it will definitely guarantee the quality of these calves.
• For a purebred procedure or seed stock, you will need purebred bulls to breed with purebred cows. This can be any breed of your choice, from Limousin to Angus and even Piedmont. But you raise pedigree cattle not to sell the beef at market (although you will have to find a market that will sell your cull cattle), but for other producers. Promoting good quality bulls and heifers is what the seed producer does.

Warnings

• If you have more than one bull in your herd, there is a risk that there may be more fighting than mating, and a risk that one or more of your bulls may be injured or even killed. This often happens when there are too many bulls in a herd, or when you have two bulls that are the same age and size relative to each other.
  • Be very careful at the time of year when mating occurs. Hormone levels are raging like crazy and you don't want to be caught in the wrong place at the wrong time! Some bulls may be more dangerous than others, but none the bull should not be trusted.
• If you choose artificial insemination, you must remember that there is only a 60-70% success rate when using this method of reproduction.
  • Using a cleaner bull is the best method for increasing the success rate in your cattle breeding and minimizes the number of times you use AI technology, as AI must come out before your cows can be re-engineered.

Breeding cows for milk is a profitable and profitable business in Russia, as it can bring impressive profits to the farmer and the opportunity to use natural, environmentally friendly products for personal purposes. For larger production, farmers can choose the most dairy breeds of cows.

The dairy industry is one of the most important elements in modern livestock farming. While in the structure of the Russian meat market, beef accounts for only about 15% of total consumption, cow's milk and its processed products account for more than 90% of the dairy market. Thus, the demand for this type of product is high enough for dairy farming to be of some interest to investors and entrepreneurs. Well, among those villagers who do not want to move to the city and are determined to stay in their native land, raising cows for milk is becoming a popular type of business.

Dairy market in Russia

According to statistics, the average consumption of milk and dairy products in our country is about 250 kg per person. This is an average of about 700 g per day, which on the one hand is quite a lot, but on the other hand, our fellow citizens do not reach medical standards for the volume of milk consumption by about 30%. This is due not only to the lack of habit of drinking milk among residents of large cities, but also to the general shortage of this product on the domestic market.

According to calculations by the Ministry of Agriculture, even with such a low level of consumption, Russia's level of self-sufficiency in milk and dairy products is slightly more than 80%. Moreover, to achieve a minimum level of food security, this indicator must at least exceed 90%.

If we look at the general state of dairy production, the situation does not look positive at all. At the end of 2015, gross milk production at enterprises of all types (including private households with a cow) amounted to 30.78 million tons, which almost exactly repeats the result of the previous 2014. At the same time, as noted in the Ministry of Agriculture, milk production at livestock farms increased by 2.4%, or by 350 thousand tons (up to 14.7 million tons), but in private farmsteads of villagers, which account for about half of dairy production in the country, a decline of 474.5 thousand tons was recorded. Thus, the long-term trend towards increasing the share of industrial milk producers in total output continues.

Another trend affecting the overall picture in the industry in 2015 was an increase in milk yield per cow. Thus, in large livestock complexes, one cow produced an average of 5233 kg of milk, which is 336 kg, or 6.9% more than in 2014.

After the closure of the Russian market for most European producers in 2014, the production of dairy products in Russia increased significantly in 2015. In particular, they began to produce 21% more cheese than in 2014 (414 thousand tons), cheese products - by 18% (121 thousand tons), cottage cheese and curd products - by 6% (728 thousand tons). The production of butter also increased, although not as significantly, by 3% (258.9 thousand tons). And only producers of milk powder and cream reduced production volumes: 111.7 thousand tons of this product, that is, 14% less than in 2014.

Problems of the dairy farming industry

As can be concluded based on the statistics given above, the Russian village is gradually losing its status as a leading milk producer, and the market is gradually passing into the hands of livestock enterprises, that is, business. However, the increase in milk production in livestock farms is proceeding at a rather slow pace, sometimes not keeping pace with the rate of decline in production indicators in rural areas. After the ban on the import of Ukrainian and European cheeses, milk and butter, it was expected that Russian producers would begin to increase volumes at a very high rate, but this did not happen. While cheese and butter makers actually showed an increase of tens of percent, milk production increased by only 2.5%.

The main reason for this, as before, remains the rather low profitability of production itself in the dairy industry. Entrepreneurs are much more willing to invest money in expanding existing and opening new poultry and pig farms, where profitability is 17% and 20%, respectively. Against this background, breeding dairy cows, which provides only 6-8% profitability (and even then taking into account government subsidies), does not look at all attractive.

However, low profitability is only half the problem. The other half is the increased cost of the start-up investment to expand or launch a cattle business. After the government stopped subsidizing the purchase of breeding stock abroad in 2015, hoping to stimulate the growth of the domestic market for breeding animals, domestic cattle breeders found themselves in a situation where Russian breeding plants are not yet able to produce sufficient volumes of high-quality cattle, and somewhere to get it all equally necessary. So you still have to buy animals abroad, but only more expensive (devaluation plus the abolition of subsidies).

In addition to rising prices for livestock, start-up costs for the construction of buildings for livestock enterprises and equipment for them have also increased. This is due to inflation and devaluation, which significantly affected the cost of building materials and equipment.

All these factors together have significantly delayed the payback period for investments in large-scale milk production. Instead of the previous 10-12 years, the payback period has reached 15 years, which is too long for domestic business.

Dairy cow breeds

Despite all the difficulties described above, dairy farming continues to be an interesting area for business, especially for small and medium-sized ones. The key difference between mini-farms and large livestock complexes is their flexibility and easy adaptability to current circumstances. If all large livestock centers are like two peas in a pod, since they are made according to the same patterns, then the family farming business always adapts to local conditions, which is why two mini-farms will always be very different.

For example, if a farm has only two to three dozen cows, it is not necessary to keep them in a pen all year round. If there are free, unoccupied meadows in the area (something, but there is enough space in Russia for everyone), in the warm season the animals can be kept free grazing. And this is just one of many ways to reduce costs and speed up the return on investment.

However, in any case, breeding cows for milk as a business will be successful only if you breed highly productive purebred animals from the very beginning. Fortunately, for small farms it is possible to purchase a batch of such cows even at domestic breeding plants.

Today, the following breeds are most popular among professional farmers:

Breeding cows for milk as a business

Cattle breeding business, like any other type of entrepreneurial activity, first requires careful, lengthy preparation and only then decisive but deliberate actions. If you plan to launch a small farm with several dozen animals, then the entrepreneur himself will have to assume the bulk of the responsibilities for business planning and production management. And for this it is necessary to carefully study the theoretical part of the issue and it is highly advisable to familiarize yourself with the practice adopted at already operating enterprises.

In general, preparation for starting your own dairy farm should include the following steps:

Having dealt with the preparatory part, you can begin to draw up a business plan. From this moment on, organizing a dairy business is no longer fundamentally different from any other production activity: calculating start-up and operating expenses, drawing up a forecast of income, preliminary calculation of production costs. If all the numbers in the business plan come together as desired, you can proceed directly to creating a business: start building barns, purchasing equipment, registering a business, hiring staff, purchasing livestock, organizing the production process.

Production