| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | CONTACT: Ron Zellar |
| June 8, 2008 | (406) 444-3144 |
Beef Genetics Delegation Returning to Russia
HELENA, Mont. — Officials from two Montana companies seeking to sell beef genetics in Russia will make a return trip this month to meet with government and business leaders in Moscow and St. Petersburg.
On the June 16-24 trip will be Keith and Darrell Stevenson of Stevenson Basin Angus Ranch near Hobson; Jack Holden, owner of Holden Herefords near Valier; and Marty Earnheart, marketing officer at the Montana Department of Agriculture. The group plans to meet with Nikolay Demin, general director of Mikoyanovskiy, a meat processing plant; Sergey Goncharov, owner of Sputnik, a black angus ranch near St. Petersburg; and Andrey Zhuravlev and Igor Koskin, two businessmen who visited Montana livestock genetics facilities in May.
The United States recently received clearance to export live breeding cattle and embryos to Russia, which has heightened interest in business relationships with Montana's renowned cattle breeding companies, says Montana Agriculture Director Ron de Yong.
Climates in the two countries are similar, and Montana beef animals are bred to withstand harsh winter conditions, notes de Yong.
Holden and Darrell Stevenson also were members of a delegation that visited Russian dairy and beef breeding companies in October 2007. During the last two years, Montana breeders exported bull semen worth more than $5 million to cattle breeders in more than 15 countries. A grant from the United States Livestock Genetics Export program helped pay for the trade missions.
For more information about the department's meat and livestock genetics marketing program, contact the Montana Department of Agriculture at (406) 444-3144 or by email at agr@mt.gov.
