The joint venture will produce grandparent females to drive expansion of Besun's integrated pork production business and enhance PIC's capacity to supply its signature genetics to other leading players that are emerging in the rapid consolidation of China's pig industry. In full swing, the herd will underpin production of 10 million slaughter pigs per year.

Besun is the brainchild of Yan Jun Fang, its entrepreneurial female founder, whose first foray into the animal feed business began humbly, mixing ingredients in the garage of her home. Today, the company produces 150,000 MT each year, farms 20,000 sows and operates its own slaughter facilities and 90 retail outlets. It plans to increase its production base to support an annual kill of 3.9 million pigs within 10 years.

The collaboration with PIC builds on the relationship forged between the two companies since 2010 when Besun crystallized its vision of large scale integrated production to provide the market with a secure supply of quality pork, in terms of both volume and safety for the consumer. Management recognized at an early stage that healthy genetics is the key foundation for the strategy to prosper and took the decision to align with the global leader in the field, a conclusion reinforced by PIC's established presence in China. This resulted in a first agreement for PIC to supply 4,500 GPs to a newly constructed multiplication farm in 2011, the animals being delivered from one of PIC's four existing nucleus farms in the country. The success of this initial transaction convinced the companies to scale up their cooperation and work together to realize a sustainable platform to support their respective targets for growth.

The new nucleus farm in Yongshou County was recently completed and stocking is scheduled over the next nine months. The facility has been built to a high standard and includes filtering of incoming air to reduce infection risks. PIC will manage the operation of the farm and the output will be used proportionally by the joint venture partners, with Besun using its proportion in its multiplication program and PIC's share providing important additional volume to support its growing sales of breeding animals in China.

Commenting on the deal, Nancy Jiang, General Manager of Genus China, said "China is a specific target area of growth for Genus, in both pigs and dairy, and the agreement with Besun is an important milestone on the strategic road map for PIC in the world's largest pork market. We are delighted to be working with such an inspiring partner dedicated, as we are, to the stable supply of nutritious and safe pork, at the same time making more efficient use of valuable feed resources. This is a model we fully expect to replicate elsewhere in the country."

Ms Yan agrees: "Food security has to come first. Food safety is also of paramount importance and our mission at Besun is to provide safe pork products to our consumers. The two Chinese characters in the name Besun mean Natural and Flavorsome and that is exactly what we aim to achieve by controlling the entire pork chain, from feed milling, modern pig farms, state of the art slaughtering and processing facilities plus our own distribution and retail operations. We also have a duty to support the local rural communities and help smaller farmers increase their income which we are doing through our contracted raising scheme."