“EkoNiva” wants to process all its milk in Voronezh region

The company revised its plans to build a large processing plant with a capacity of over 500 tons per day, intending in the future to upgrade Anninskiy dairy plant to the necessary power, and it also does not exclude the possibility of purchase and conversion of a milk-canning plant in Nizhny Kislyai producing condensed milk. Experts note that the volume of investment in the expansion of a long-running enterprise will depend on the state of its infrastructure.

Stefan Durr told about the plans of “EkoNiva” to expand the raw material base and processing capacities in Voronezh region. According to him, now the farms of “EkoNiva” in all regions produce 1.36 thousand tons of milk per day. About half of raw milk within the company is produced in Voronezh region. At present the company is processing 300 tons per day, said Mr. Durr. Approximately half of this volume is accounted for the Anninskiy dairy plant purchased from PepsiCo at the beginning of the year, about 30 tons — for the first small processing plant of the company in the village Shchuchye of Liski district in the same region (the rest — for "Mosmedynagroprom" in Kaluga region). The cheese factory of the company with a processing capacity of 60 tons per day is also being built in Voronezh region. It should be launched by the end of 2018. Investments in it were earlier estimated at 600 million rubles.

At the same time, plans for the construction of a large milk processing plant in Voronezh region with a capacity of 500 to 800 tons per day (it became known in 2015) were adjusted after the purchase of “Anninskoye moloko”. "I think that we will develop the Anninskiy dairy plant", told Mr. Durr to Kommersant. - Soon we will produce 1.2 thousand tons of milk in Voronezh region and it would be wrong if the plant processed less". At the same time, specific parameters of modernization, according to him, have not been determined yet: now there is a discussion of details. For the time being the restarted enterprise is unprofitable. But the site of the plant allows expanding its capacity, explained earlier the head of Anna district Vasily Avdeev to "Kommersant". According to him, the restart of production lines for butter and ice cream can bring the company to a capacity of 400 tons per day. 

"EkoNiva" has already invested in the modernization of the "Anninskoye moloko", but, according to Mr. Durr, these investments were not large-scale: for example, 10 million rubles was directed for butter production. Now the company produces pasteurized milk, butter and milk powder and also restarted the line for the production of ice cream. The Finnish company Valio wanted to place its orders at the plant, but the parties have not yet come to an agreement, said Mr. Durr.

During the next year and a half, “EkoNiva” intends to continue the construction of dairy complexes in Voronezh region. The structure of the company in the region includes 26 livestock units (including nine new dairy complexes). Next complexes for 2.8 thousand milking cows each (about 2.2 billion rubles) began to be built in Dobrino, Peskovatka and Petropavlovka of Liski district, Staraya Chigla of Anna district and close to Bobrovo. The farms in Korshevo of Bobrovo district and Bodeevka of Liski district are close to completion. In addition, in early May, “EkoNiva” acquired LLC "Agrofirma Shipova Dubrava" in Buturlinovka district, engaged in plant growing on 10 thousand hectares, and plans to start the construction of another dairy complex for 2.8 thousand milking cows in autumn. Earlier, the enterprise was managed by MC "Molproekt" (controlled by SMP-Bank). The structure of this company now also includes producers of canned food (including dairy) LLC “Sukhonsky dairy plant”(Vologda region) and CJSC "Nizhnekislyayskaya dairy company" (Buturlinovka district of Voronezh region).

Following the "Shipova Dubrava" “EkoNiva” can purchase Nizhnekislyayskaya dairy company, said Mr. Durr: "We might buy the factory, if they sell it cheap. If we buy it, we will produce cream cheese or cottage cheese there - we see that cottage cheese is well sold". At present the enterprise in Nizhniy Kislyai can produce according to the project up to 8 million standard cans of vegetable products and up to 2.5 million standard cans of condensed milk per month. The enterprise has been temporarily suspended since April 2018 due to the need to replace the floor covering, but then will continue to produce condensed milk, explained in the regional Department of agricultural policy.

The Voronezh dairy complexes of “EkoNiva” in recent years have supplied raw milk to the structures of "Molvest", Bobrovsky cheese plant, to the structures Danone, Efremovskiy cheese plant (Tula region, the structure of the French Lactalis), Belgorodskiy dairy plant (part of the Italian Parmalat). The supply of raw materials from these companies is diversified, and “Molvest” is actively building its dairy complexes in Voronezh region, so only small contractors of “EkoNiva” can suffer from the lack of raw materials.

The head of JSC "Moloko" (manages the largest independent dairy plant in Voronezh region) Vasily Ostroushko notes that the expansion of the Anninsky plant will depend significantly on the state of its infrastructure. Managing partner of the expert group Veta Ilya Zharsky emphasizes that the Nizhnekislyaskiy plant accounts for less than 5% of the Russian market of condensed milk, so its possible conversion "is unlikely to affect the balance of power and consumer preferences. "It was difficult for Mr. Zharsky to compare the average profitability of the production of condensed milk and cottage cheese because of the large share of falsification on the market. He estimated the cost of Nizhnekislyaskiy plant at not more than several dozen million rubles due to high debt load. However, the experts found it difficult to estimate the cost of possible expansion of the Anninskiy plant due to the lack of specific parameters, but investments in the construction of a dairy plant with a capacity of 500 tons per day were earlier estimated at about 10 billion rubles.

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