The middle of the Saudi Desert is n’t really the first place you ’d think of as the location for the world ’s largest dairy farm but that ’s exactly where Al Safi Farms produces 122,000 gallons of milk a twenty-four hour period .
During the panics in 1973 in response to the oil trade embargo crisis , the Saudi Royal Family realized that their food for thought supply infrastructure was grossly inadequate to efficaciously reply to external pressing or famine . In reply , the king decreed that his country would become ego - sufficient in its food supplying . ( It ’s proficient to be the king . ) To carry out this , the Saudi government intemperately subsidized most every facet of the food product system — from paying for farmers ’ irrigation and harvesting equipment to pay the freight charges to import dairy farm cows from Europe . Prince Abdullah al - Faisal ’s farm , Al Safi , quickly grow to be the largest dairy farm in the kingdom . In 1998 , the Guinness Book of World Records recognized it as the big integrate dairy farm farm on the planet .
Established in 1979 , Al Safi Dairy is locate in the Al Sahba Valley , about 100 km southest of Riyadh . It covers 3,500 hectares of land ( 35 square mi ) , maintains a ruck of 37,000 Holstein cattle , and is the primary supplier to the Al Safi Danone company .
As an integrated dairy farm , Al Safi manages the full milk product procedure . It develop the hay that the cows run through ; maintains and milks the herd ; processes and box the milk ; and delivers the last Cartesian product to stores across the UAE in Safi trucks . But it does n’t look like a farm you ’d see in the Midwest .
Al Safi ’s fields are dry and brown . The cows are emaciated . That ’s because temperatures in the Saudi-Arabian desert can touch 120 degrees Fahrenheit , and fat cows ca n’t handle the heat . The farm use Holstein Friesian kine from Europe and Canada to produce the farm ’s daily 122,000 gallons ( 600,000 liters ) of milk . And the entire surgical operation — milk parlors , processing , packaging , and statistical distribution — are all self - contained . Foraging materials like Alfalfa , Rhodes grass , Hay and Sorghum Sudani silage are all farm onsite , while the farm ’s water provision comes from 2000 m rich wells bored into the desert .
Why so abstruse ? “ The pee from the aquifer is exceedingly hot and extremely belligerent , ” says Fred Clise , export manager for Goulds Pumps ’ water engineering divisiontold National Driller . The weewee is heated by geothermic activity in the region and contains minerals like calcium and atomic number 12 which make it extremely corrosive . So , Al Safi Farm engage an 11 - inch bronze and nickle metal CHC submersible turbine pump located 1000 metre underground to force up cool water from below . The 1,000HP pump motility about 1200 congius / minute . The fountainhead themselves have to be clad in 3 - inch untarnished steel to not rust in the fantastically hot and unfriendly waters .
Once water is topside , it ’s pumped into cooling pond or through a circulating tube system to evaporate the heat until it ’s a safe temperature to drink . The well system provides not just the piss for the ruck ( each oral sex waste between 70 - 115 liters of water per day ) and water the crops , but is also employed to help oneself bewilder the scorching Saudi summer . Each cattle pen is also equipped with evaporative cool down systems and aviation - droplet cool down fans nerveless as well as special awnings for the cow to shelter under when the heating becomes too much .
Al Safi Farm run 24 time of day a daylight throughout the twelvemonth . Every aspect of production is monitored by a custom built in - house software entourage which allows worker to not only maximise production but keep herd diseases like Hoof & Mouth in check .
for extract the precious cow juice from more than 30,000 Bos taurus , hand - milking simply is n’t feasible . Al Safi employs 14 in full automatize milk parlors . Each milk living-room can process 120 cows every 12 mo or just about 3,100 cows , three metre a day . Milking unit bond teatcups ( “ nipple - cups ” not “ teacups ” ) to the heifer ’s udder . The cupful consist of a hard outer shell with a pliable lining , which allows the auto to milk a moo-cow in a distinct fashion from the human hand or calf mouth . A uninterrupted vacuum is applied to the internal liner , creating a press difference across the teat duct , which sucks out the milk . unluckily the vacuum also sucks stemma into the mammilla , which jams up the cognitive process . So , once a second , the vacuity is publish from the inner liner and the teat can take over the congestion .
[ Saudi Tourism Board – Chakra – Al Safi Danone – Al Safi Dairy – National Driller ]
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