Boosting cattle productivity is a key goal of the national project Technological Support of Food Security, which covers five major areas: breeding and genetics, machinery and equipment, staff, veterinary drugs, and biotechnology.
Oksana Lut, the Russian Federation's Minister of Agriculture, highlighted the need to establish the production of vitamins, amino acids, and feed additives, among other things.
Vladislav Romantsev, Director for Strategic Development at EFKO, reported on the key challenges of biotech for agricultural businesses and initiatives that Russian dairy producers can already participate in.
He emphasized that biotechnology encompasses a vast range of products essential for producing dairy goods of the quality consumers expect. The National Project target of 75% availability of enzymes and feed additives by 2030 (with a baseline of 30% in 2023) is a very ambitious goal. The solution requires a collective effort: science, business, and, naturally, the backing of governments.

EFKO Director for Strategic Development
The second issue is scaling. In biotech, transitioning from one production level to a large fermenter can't be achieved by multiplying the values. Every transition is technology elaboration. The primary challenge is the shortage of scientific groups in this field. One possible solution could be launching two specialized laboratories in our top scientific institutes, initiated by the Ministry of Agriculture."
The agro-biotech park project, implemented in 2024 in the Belgorod region, is also intended to increase the efficiency of domestic biotech. A ready-made infrastructure that enables the scaling of biotechnology. Currently, it is fully staffed and ready to welcome residents.
EFKO's priority facility in biotechnology for the dairy industry is an enzyme plant that produces basic enzymes for feed. We are proceeding with the project and have already completed some complex engineering.
"If we talk about challenges, the Russian market is still too small for biotechnology products to get an effective economy," Vladislav Romantsev believes. "Therefore, from the very beginning, we are considering and practicing technologies that will allow us to aim at the world level. We aim to ensure that the cost and efficiency of our products are competitive in both the domestic and export markets. We believe that we can build a scientific base for promising developments – here we do not doubt our scientists – and then contribute to providing people in different countries with tasty and healthy food."