Singapore, China jointly establish feed to meat pilot project
Isolated from the rest of China by natural barriers, Jilin province is about to become China's test lab for the production of world-class feed, meat and agricultural produce. China gives Singapore first rights to world class pork in return for the Lion City's technical expertise.
On May 21, at a ceremony at Singapore's St. Regis Hotel, China's Jilin province, the government of Singapore and private sector partners from both countries signed into existence the China Jilin (Singapore) Modern Agricultural Cooperation Food Zone.
The first MOU obliges Singapore's Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority (AVA) and Jilin's municipal Government to establish a joint technical working group that will guide, advise and monitor Jilin's progress towards the creation of a 1,450 square kilometre disease free zone that adheres to the livestock and meat processing standards of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). Over the next six years, this geographically enclosed area will developed into the production platform for a new generation of safe, export quality Chinese meat exports.
The second MOU calls for the establishment of a joint venture between state-owned Singapore Food Industries Pte Ltd (SFI) and DaChan Food (Asia) Company, a large Chinese feed and meat processing company. Called Jilin China-Singapore Food Zone Development Construction Investment Company, the joint venture will construct modern, integrated hog farm and meat processing facilities in Jilin province's Yongji county.
A third MOU signed between the newly formed Jilin China-Singapore Food Zone Development Construction Investment Company joint venture and Yongji county's government made the latter a third partner in the firm.
A fourth MOU authorised Singbridge, a subsidiary of Singapore government-owned Temasek Holdings to conduct the planning and assessment for the 1,450 kilometre food zone's development. Singbridge, which already planned and designed successful Singapore-China industrial joint ventures in Suzhou city and several other locations, will now bring its expertise to bear on this pilot project of China's agribusiness supply chain.
A fifth MOU provides for the Singapore government-owned Fullerton Financial Holdings to build a network of village banks and provide agribusiness credit to the region's farmers and agribusiness stakeholders.
Together, these MOUs will guide the private and public sector development of this 1,450 square kilometre China Jilin (Singapore) Modern Agricultural Cooperation Food Zone. This particular region was chosen because its mountains, rivers and wetlands geographically isolate this exceptionally fertile part of Jilin province from the rest of China. With natural 
barriers cordoning off this zone, it will be used as a pilot project for creating it an exceptionally safe, export-ready feed-to-meat supply chain.
Naturally, the latter implies the creation of downstream industries such as export-ready safe and healthy meat processing, food testing and inspection systems and agribusiness logistics. In addition to benefiting the local population, a successful Food Zone would also help enhance China's reputation as an international producer of safe quality food.
The venture will take up to six years to reach fruition. Thereafter, lessons learned and technical expertise gleaned from this project can then be used to bring the rest of China's feed-to-meat supply chain up to world standards.
At the signing ceremony, Ma Bow Tan, Singapore's minister for national development explained that, "Singapore imports food from all over the world and has a stringent food safety regime. China wants to strengthen its food safety regime and produce food for both domestic and export markets. There is a lot of complementarities for our two countries to collaborate in this Food Zone project."
