BAKU, Azerbaijan, Feb. 4
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
Kazakhstan’s market security is 80 percent or more for all major types of food, and even over 100 percent for some of them, Kazakhstan’s Minister of Agriculture Saparkhan Omarov said, Trend reports with reference to the press office of Kazakhstan’s prime minister.
Omarov noted that the ministry is implementing measures to saturate the domestic market with food products.
“In particular, import substitution will be carried out on poultry meat, cheese and cottage cheese, butter, sugar, apples and sausages. Long-term industry programs have already been developed. This year 25 dairy farms with a capacity of 105,000 tons, three meat processing plants, eight poultry farms with a capacity of 73,000 tons will be constructed, gardens are to be laid on 2,000 hectares, construction of two sugar factories with a total production capacity of 200,000 tons of sugar per year has begun in Zhambyl and Pavlodar regions and another three existing sugar factories,” the minister said.
Irrigated land will be expanded by 45,000 hectares, expansion by 15,000 hectares will account for vegetables growing land. This will reduce the share of import from 36.2 percent to 31.2 percent in 2020. Complete saturation of local market with these products is expected in 2024.
Omarov noted that the positive developments are already observed. Thus, the yield of apples over the past three years has grown from 70 to 74 kg per ha. The production increased by 18 percent. The supply of locally produced apples increased from 65 to 69.5 percent.
Sugar production increased from 345,000 tons to 505,000 tons, and productivity went up from 285 to 305 kg per ha. The availability of domestic sugar increased from seven to 14 percent.
Production of cheese and cottage cheese increased by 7.5 percent in 2019 and amounted to 29,500 tons. Local production covers 58 percent of the local market demand.
Poultry meat production over three years increased by 26 percent and amounted to 192,000 tons.
Pasta production amounted to 165,300 tons in 2019 which is 4.3 percent more than in 2018, domestic consumption is estimated at 140,000 tons, which is fully covered by local production.
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