Qatar uncowed: Boycott-busting bovine arrive to boost milk supplies

A first batch of boycott-busting cows have been airlifted to Qatar to boost milk supplies in the country after a Saudi-led coalition cut ties with Doha last month.

MENA

2 min read

The New Arab & agencies

13 July, 2017

Qatar - Boycott busting bovine

A first batch of boycott-busting cows have been airlifted to Qatar to boost milk supplies in the country after a Saudi-led coalition cut ties with Doha last month.

Prior to the diplomatic crisis, Qatar relied on dairy imports from Saudi Arabia, especially of milk, with half of all imports of foodstuffs coming from neighboring Gulf countries.

Since the blockade began on June 5, Qatar has resorted to importing food from different countries including Turkey, Iran and Morocco.

New shipping routes have also been opened with Oman to circumnavigate the siege.

"We brought in 165 Holsteins, all highly bred Holsteins, especially for dairy," said John Dore, a senior manager at Baladna Livestock Production.

"There are 35 milking cows, that are in milk at present and there's 130 that will calve in the next two-to-three weeks."

The several dozen Holsteins were flown in from Budapest by a Qatar Airways cargo plane on Tuesday, and are the first of 4,000 cattle to be imported by August.

The cattle will be farmed for both milk and meat.

Qatar aims to increase by five-fold the number of cattle it has in the country as it looks to lessen its food dependency on imports as a result of the ongoing blockade.

"Before, most of the milk in Qatar was imported from Saudi Arabia and the UAE," said Dore.

"At the moment the gap is being filled by Turkish imports, which are welcome for the present but the quality won't compare with local produce."

Moutaz al-Khayyat, the chairman of Qatari firm Power International which bought and imported the cows, told Bloomberg News that once all the 4,000 cows arrive in Qatar, they will meet around 30 percent of the country's dairy needs.

He said it could take up to 60 flights to bring all the cattle into Qatar.

The bemused bovine took to their new surroundings at a farm north of Doha on Wednesday surrounded by journalists, with their arrival a sign of the Gulf state's defiance of the Saudi-led blockade.

Qatari officials have confidently claimed they can withstand the boycott "forever".