Agribusinesses Hung Nhon, De Heus kick off $8.4 mln livestock project

Vietnam’s Hung Nhon Group started construction of a VND200 billion ($8.44 million) high-tech animal husbandry project in cooperation with Dutch partner De Heus in the southern province of Tay Ninh on Monday.

The 39.5 hectare poultry breeding facility called DHN Tay Ninh will have an annual capacity of 20 million eggs. It is part of a memorandum of understanding between De Heus, Hung Nhon, and Tay Ninh People’s Committee to develop a high-tech agricultural complex in Tan Chau district with VND2.5 trillion ($106.5 million) in investment.

Speaking at the ceremony on Monday, Tay Ninh Chairman Nguyen Thanh Ngoc lauded Hung Nhon and De Heus for the speedy progress of the project just a month after the agreement was signed.

Hung Nhon will strive to put the project into operation in the first quarter of 2024, said Vu Manh Hung, chairman and CEO of the firm.

Rick van der Linden, director of De Heus Vietnam's genetics division, said the project would help Tay Ninh province become a leading hub for livestock supplies.

At the event, De Heus and Hung Nhon presented VND500 million ($21,088) to Tan Chau district’s fund to build charitable houses and 20 bicycles to needy students.

Per the MoU signed on June 2, the complex will include facilities for high-tech livestock farming, high-tech cultivation, livestock slaughtering and processing, material production for animal feed, and a breeding research center.

DHN, a joint venture between De Heus and Hung Nhon, plans to reach an annual capacity of 10,000 great-grandparent pigs in the Central Highlands, 200,000 sows for the southeastern and southcentral regions and the Central Highlands, and 58 million chicks reared for consumption, along with 25 million chickens for Tay Ninh province.

In the first half of 2023, Vietnam’s GDP expanded by 3.72% year-on-year, the General Statistics Office (GSO) said. The agriculture-forestry-fisheries sector rose 3.07%, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development reported. The performance was in line with the sector’s target of 3%-3.5% growth this year, including a 1.49% rise in cultivation; rice production of 42.9 million tons; 7.01% growth in animal husbandry, featuring 4.5 million tons of pork and 2.1 million tons of poultry meat; 3.27% growth in fisheries, with 9.05 million tons of products; and a 3.22% increase in forestry, with 22 million cubic meters of harvested wood.

The sector has targeted an export revenue of $54-55 billion this year, the ministry added.