The project of the Qatari milk and dairy products giant Baladna in Algeria is starting to take shape. Announced in November, it has just reached an important milestone with the signing of a contract between the giant Qatari farm and the Algerian government.
In Algeria, Baladna will set up a giant farm over an area of 100,000 hectares, to produce 200,000 tonnes of powdered milk per year, according to the Doha News site, which cites a source close to the matter. No deadline has been given for the completion of the project.
During his interview with two Algerian media on Saturday evening, President Abdelmadjid Tebboune announced the upcoming launch in Adrar of an Algerian-Qatari project aimed at installing a mega dairy farm in the south of the country. This ambitious program aims to achieve Algeria’s self-sufficiency in milk.
Imports of milk powder
According to Khaled Soualmia, director general of the National Interprofessional Office for Milk and Dairy Products (ONIL), imports of milk powder are significant.
In 2022, he confided to Echourouk: “175,000 tonnes of milk powder are distributed annually to produce subsidized milk”. He added that the bill for its imports is “estimated at around 600 million dollars”.
He also believed: “reducing the importation of milk powder requires the development of the milk sector”.
In mid-March, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Youssef Cherfa, indicated that “the agricultural services ensure that a study of all available agricultural areas is carried out to best respond to the demand for the Qatari part, particularly about the vast areas intended for projects of a strategic nature.”
On this occasion, he recalled that “the Qatari company had previously expressed its desire to invest in the agricultural sector, particularly in the milk sector and the breeding of dairy cows, and that as a result, an agreement was reached between the Algerian and Qatari parties to implement investment projects for the benefit of the company “Baladna” in Algeria in the field of dairy production. The project targets an annual production of 336 million liters of milk.
Qatar, alfalfa imports
The installation of a mega dairy farm in Qatar follows the conflict between it and its Gulf neighbors in 2017. The small gas emirate had to face an economic blockade.
In the days that followed, this country sent emissaries, notably to Turkey, to import food products by plane. Qatar then decided to create a mega-dairy farm from scratch to ensure local milk supplies. This is by calling on foreign experts (American, Dutch, and English). The first batches of cows were then imported by plane from the United States.
Today on an area of several hundred hectares, the Baladna dairy has stables with a capacity of 20,000 dairy cows and a dairy allowing the bottling of milk and its distribution throughout the country.
As the country is arid, fodder is imported from Sudan where Qatar today has tens of thousands of hectares. The square bales of alfalfa are loaded into metal containers and then sent by boat to ports in Qatar. As for corn and soya, it is imported from the United States and Latin American countries.
The Baladna dairy is linked to the Hassad Food Fund founded in 2008. It has a capital of one billion dollars.
In 2022, a study by a Lebanese university recalled the strategy of this Qatari fund: “It thus buys thousands of hectares of arable land in various regions of the world such as Turkey, Ukraine, Brazil, or even Kenya. It is mainly present in Sudan where it has more than 101,171 hectares of land to cultivate and in Australia where it produces more than 15,000 tonnes of grain.”
A strategy also used by Saudi Arabia. In 2019, geographer Alain Cariou noted: “To feed its dairy cows and poultry, the Almaraï company owns 12,300 hectares in Argentina for corn and soybeans and 5,600 in Arizona and California for alfalfa hay.”
As for the Jenaan company, based in Abu Dhabi (United Arab Emirates), it operates 10,000 hectares in Sudan and 62,000 in Egypt. “The objective is above all to produce fodder (alfalfa, sorghum, corn) exported by container from Port Sudan to the Emirates,” indicates a university study.
Baladna, a factory farm
The installations of the Baladna company are marked by gigantism. These are trailer trucks that distribute the fodder along the feed troughs in the barns and milking is done on rotating trays allowing up to 100 cows to be milked per hour. Fans are installed in the stables to combat the heat, and the cows are showered during each milking.
Foreign agricultural engineers and veterinarians ensure the well-being of the animals. Menial tasks are carried out by workers mostly from the Indian continent.
Baladna in Algeria: three challenges to overcome
The particularity of the Algerian project is to build a mega-farm with the corresponding stables but also to produce the fodder consumed by the animals. For concentrated feed, imports of corn and soya can be used, as in the case of poultry farming.
In the case of breeding dairy cows, however, it is necessary to have fodder available: alfalfa hay and corn silage. The recent development in Algeria of an oilseed crushing industry for the production of table oil should make it possible to use by-products including soybean meals.
The production of alfalfa will require its cultivation under irrigation pivots and the mobilization of significant groundwater.
The consumption of milk as well as white meat currently allows low-income households access to proteins of animal origin. Proteins can also be provided by consuming dried vegetables.
A major challenge
The success of this mega-farm in southern Algeria will therefore require removing three obstacles. First, master the reproduction, health monitoring, and feeding programs for a considerable number of animals.
Equipping electronic collars on each dairy cow should make it possible to monitor the condition of each animal. The second challenge will be to combat the scorching temperatures in the South.
Finally, it will be necessary to produce enough alfalfa to feed the thousands of dairy cows and their calves. Remember that in the case of the Baladna farm and El Maraï in Saudi Arabia, the fodder is imported. As such, the Algerian mega-farm project planned in the South will be unique in the world.
