The feed operations are located about 500km from Moscow, in Lipetsk.
The site is in the Central Federal District where 60% of Russian feed is produced and where 73% of Russian leading vertical integrators are concentrated.
The Russian market keeps growing at a very rapid pace, with several of the investments made a couple of years ago now bearing fruit, said Dr Tom Verleyen, marketing director, EMEA, Kemin.
The Lipetsk factory build was planned long before the sanctions were imposed on European imports, said the company. It is part of the company’s long-term strategy to have local feed production facilities in large markets, said Verleyen.
The plant’s capacity at start-up will be 12,000 Mt per year. It will serve the whole of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) region, he said.
Russian feed production
With 500 mills, Russia is one of the biggest feed markets in Europe. Last year saw it produce around 29 million metric tons of feed, around the same as 2015, according to Alltech’s latest Global Feed Tonnage Survey.
Broiler production accounted for some 10.6m Mt tons of that total tonnage, while the layer segment represented 4.20m Mt.
Pig production in Russia accounted for 9.60m Mt of the recorded feed tonnage output, and dairy 2.70m Mt, noted Alltech's report.
Local raw materials
“An internal project is ongoing to maximize local supply of quality raw materials. The goal is to have over 50% of the total volume supplied locally. All local supplies need to comply with quality standards set by Kemin on a global level,” Verleyen told us.
Kemin will be producing its whole product portfolio of animal nutrition and health products sold in the Russian region in the new factory, including both liquid and dry products.
The factory will target all animal segments from poultry to swine to dairy and aquaculture, leveraging the dynamism that exists currently in the Russian livestock production sector.
Localizing manufacturing in this way, said the feed additives producer, reduces order to delivery time for producers, ensures local availability of high quality feed ingredients, and reduces supply chain risks due to transportation.
It said the site would also allow for greater collaboration between its scientists and regional players that could result in new products tailored for the Russian market.