Export
Issue No. 39 - February/March 2008
Russian trade alive and well
Agricultural export pioneer Larissa Vakulina proves why SA needs migrant talent - and why we need to listen to their experience.
A trained engineer and MBA, Larissa and husband Andrei founded Expo-Trade in August 1999 after she couldn’t find work here because her credentials were not recognised.
By 2005 Expo-Trade was landing $12 million worth of frozen meat and other agricultural products in Russia per year.
Expo-Trade introduced lambskin to the Russian market, where it won immediate demand as a fashion material. The firm now exports 600,000 to 700,000 skins per year.
Expo-Trade has seven permanent staff at its Port Adelaide office and Larissa travels to Russia to refresh contacts twice a year.
In 2006 a grander opportunity arose when Larissa was shocked to discover Russia was a net importer of beef.
Incredibly the superpower, one of the fastest-growing markets in the world, has to import fresh meat as its livestock industry was ruined by communist mismanagement.
Larissa says pre-revolutionary Russia mustered about 65 million head of cattle but today the nation has only 22 million, 99% of them dairy cattle. Local meat supply in Russia was in steady decline.
“The beef industry in Russia did not exist,” Larissa says, bluntly. “To replace (imports) would require 15 million head.
“The industry lacked systems - there was no infrastructure, no reproductive technology.”
Farmers lacked capital for improvement and, at first, had no support.
“After communism collapsed, the government ignored the agricultural sector,” Larissa says. Right move under the circumstances - Russia’s focus on energy and industrials is now paying for other sectors to be rebuilt.
As Russia’s economy improved, demand for meat products began to strain Expo-Trade’s capacity and Larissa reasoned live cattle export could lift Expo-Trade to a more sophisticated level of supply.
Expo-Trade...
