Sri Lanka offers 1500 hectare land to Netherland’s firm for high tech dairy farms
A Netherland’s firm has been offered 1500 hectares at Mawathagama in Kurunegala on a long term lease basis by the government to set up three high tech dairy farms and processing facilities, officials said.
Velema Holdings, a Dutch investment company will invest US$25 million for the land and the letter of intent has been signed with the Board of Investment (BOI) recently, a senior BOI official told Business Times.
This development was confirmed by a top official attached to state run dairy company.
Some 1500 high yield milch cows will be imported for the three farms which will use solar and wind energy mostly for its operations, the BOI official said adding that the Netherlands firm will deploy their managerial team and a majority of their own work force to get dairy farms off the ground.
Dutch cows can produce up to 40 litres of milk a day, but depending on climate and feed it may be possible to produce 25 litres of milk per cow. The construction work of the farm would commence next year and the government has offered a 3-year tax holiday for the company.
Robotic milking is to be introduced for the first time in Sri Lanka to cut labour costs at the Dutch-managed dairy farms, he revealed.
This was a major out come of a Dutch business delegation including representatives of leading Dutch firms such as JIMPP Media, Abos, Defteq International BV, Beursgenoten, Fleurons & Prins, Velema Holdings, and Zonel Energy Systems who visited the island on a week-long tour recently.
According to the BOI, currently 30 Netherland investment projects are in operation in Sri Lanka with a total investment value of $437 million. These projects have been on-going from way back in 1978 (to-date).
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