Importing Cattle to Thailand, regs?

[Zatoichi]

Hi there, I'm considering importing cattle to Thailand from India. And while I have the export side squared away in India, I'm not sure of the local legal requirements for import. I currently own a company that imports and exports fresh fruits and veggies but I'm not sure about the cattle import regulations.

 

Has anyone tried importing cattle before? Would anyone be able to point me in the right direction?

 

As a side note, I have just under 20 rai in Kanchanaburi, I'm looking at raising for beef production, potentially studding as well. Even if you don't have any information about the importation regulations I would welcome any pointers from more experienced cattle farmers.

 

Thanks.

[Lamkyong]

Holy cow     dead or alive   ??

[kickstart]

About 30 years ago some SahiwalxFreisan, I think they where heifers, where imported  in to Thailand vie Malasia, from New Zealand, the Thai DLD, Department of Livestock Development was the main buyer ,and they sold them on to Thai dairy farms, they come over in 3 batches  a good few hundred at a time, as the DLD was involved I would have thought paperwork would have been not that difficult (but this was 30 years ago things might have changed since then )

So, look at Google for the DLD, in Bangkok, and contact them for more information, and I hope you can speak Thai, I would suppose no one they can speak English.

 

And, why do you want the hassle of importing live cattle into Thailand for, when you can buy cattle here in country, or it is that it takes longer to breed your own cattle? and what breeds are you thinking of importing?

Here in Thailand, you can buy Angus,Charolais, Brangus, Beefmaster, breeds most will be cross breeds with Brahman, Beefmaster will be 100%, and semen is available for all these breeds, some local semen, and some imported mainly from the USA, other beef breeds are available.

Some good quality Brahman cattle are available in Thailand, the breeding coming from the USA, they are not cheap, a good quality red Brahman heifer with all the paperwork will be 50 000baht plus.

[djayz]

33 minutes ago, Lamkyong said:

Holy cow     dead or alive   ??

"potentially studding" is best done with live animals. 

[CLW]

Given the helpful comments from KS and my own horrible experience about an attempt to officially import seeds (which ended in doing it kind of illegally) I would say forget about it.
Probably importing sperm or embryos would be easier. But that's just a guess.

[kickstart]

Hi CLW

             As I said, you can buy imported semen in Thailand, Yenwar .com, in Bangkok import semen, from the USA  both beef and dairy, they sell a lot more dairy semen than beef.

A big dairy farmer near  here use to go over to  New Zeland, with a semen tank  buy some NZ semen and come back to Thailand, and sell the semen to local farmers, how he got on with customs etc  at the airport I do not know ,and the stock from this semen did not do well here in Thailand, to hot and poor feed. even my local shop sells imported dairy semen and some locally collected Brahman semen. 

As for embryos ,the now head of the Thai DLD  breeding program ,has a few bulls of his own ,both dairy and beef ,he collect the semen and sells it, this photo (excuse the photo  quality, it was a photo of a photo )is a Blond Aquatain bull, he was an embryo transfer, he did have a Wagga embryo transfer  bull.

I have heard of other embryo programs here in Thailand, but it is not that common.

As I said before Thai's  are good at breeding cattle, most of the original stock was imported semen from the USA, some cattle were  imported, most where  Brahman's, and Indo Brazil,a  look at Thai farming magazines some of the bulls are nice animals, but, a lot of the Indo Brazil bulls  heads have been photoshopped.

 So, why the OP wants to import some stock, Thailand, and India are of similar climates, I would say the farmed cattle breeds would be the same, and some years ago Macro use to import beef from India for selling in they shops here in LOS ,so somewhere they have some good quality stock,and now Macro have Thai Angus beef for sale,Thai beef quality and stock  has gone up over the past few years,

As you said forget it and buy local stock. 

[JungleBiker]

A couple of years ago, I heard there were plans to fly in plane loads of live beef cattle from Australia for finishing off and slaughtering. I don't know if that is now happening or not. 

 

In India, the cow is a holy animal and many people are vegetarians but do consume milk and yoghurt. So I wonder if there may be a cheap supply of bulls from India and perhaps the OP is planning to so something similar to the Aussies? 

[CLW]

A couple of years ago, I heard there were plans to fly in plane loads of live beef cattle from Australia for finishing off and slaughtering. I don't know if that is now happening or not. 
 
In India, the cow is a holy animal and many people are vegetarians but do consume milk and yoghurt. So I wonder if there may be a cheap supply of bulls from India and perhaps the OP is planning to so something similar to the Aussies? 

Regarding the cost of live animal air freight it wouldn't be economical.
However, in Europe they are transporting live cattle from one end to another and across the Mediterranean Sea.
Awful for these animals. Not to mention the influence on the meat quality if they are slaughtered right after the transport.

[kickstart]

13 hours ago, JungleBiker said:

A couple of years ago, I heard there were plans to fly in plane loads of live beef cattle from Australia for finishing off and slaughtering. I don't know if that is now happening or not. 

 

In India, the cow is a holy animal and many people are vegetarians but do consume milk and yoghurt. So I wonder if there may be a cheap supply of bulls from India and perhaps the OP is planning to so something similar to the Aussies? 

I was surprised when the op said India that he wanted to export cattle from, that was my first thought the cow is a holy animal, but what I know of India it depends on which part and religious preferences, it is not all the same.

The animals may be cheap in India cost of haulage, by sea import charges, haulage down to Kanchanaburi, cannot see it paying , and as the op of another beef cattle thread is finding out beef cattle prices are dropping here in Thailand.

If he is trying fatten say  Indian bulls here in Thailand the feed costs, and quality of feed will play a big part, again as our other op has found out, feed cost have gone over budget, cannot see it working.

CLW

The live export should be highly restricted, with modern day refrigeration they should not be a need to export live animals and how they can do it in Europe with tough EU rules and regs.

The farm I worked on the UK, after I left .brought in 20 dairy heifers from France, they arrived ok, but a lot did not milk and went for the chop after one lactation, not the best management idea from the company managed farm  

Only last week 2000 sheep died on a ship going from Australia to one of the Gulf states, not for the first time, ok Gull states like live animals, not refrigerated ones, on religious grounds, and Australia like the export dollars, cannot see this trade stopping soon.

Some more information from the op on this topic would be nice.

[Zatoichi]

Gentlemen,

 

Thank you all very much for your helpful advice and information. We are considering India because we have a solid local connection on exceedingly inexpensive Indian cattle and the local resources on the ground to export without hassle. What we are wondering is what kinds of cattle would be most viable to import into Thailand and for what purpose. The more we look into it the less viable a direct to slaughter business model looks, and instead perhaps we should look at importing breeding Cattle? Perhaps for auction? Is there a website that you can go on and trade cattle? I noticed  @kickstart mentioned yenwar .com ? that doesn't seem to be a correct link? Any online auctions perhaps?

Thank you

[kickstart]

As I said what  breeds of cattle you have in India you will find them here in Thailand, Brahman cattle are a cross breed, but the origins come from India, lots  here in Thailand 

I have seen one website for selling cattle that was a Thai website all in Thai a few years ago, this being Thailand Facebook could probably be your better option, as for online auctions  I do not think Thailand has them. 

Auctions, as we know, do not exist in Thailand, most auctions are a group of pickups loaded with cattle, the buyers and sellers meet somewhere once a week or once a month, it is all word of mouth and mobile phones.

Yenwar is a company that primarily sell miking machines and dairy equipment plus imported semen. 

If you want to make a go of this, spend a month down in Kanchanaburi, find some beef farms and visit them, see what they have got, find some cattle dealers, ask them about buying and selling cattle and cattle prices, then make your mind up what to import.

[Zatoichi]

Solid advice, Thank you, much appreciated.