Turkey loses $1 billion annually due to death of 480,000 baby calves: Agricultural association

Turkey loses an average of over 15 percent of its calf population within one year of their birth, much higher than the developed world's average, and these deaths cost 3.9 billion Turkish Liras ($1 billion) annually, according to a leading agricultural association. 

The Turkish Union of Agricultural Chambers (TZOB) has called for the launching of specialized village-based calf farms to overcome these loses. 

"Our country loses 450,000 to 480,000 calves every year, out of the 3.4 million newborn calves, due to inefficient caring conditions and a general negligence in the sector. These deaths cost the Turkish economy 3.9 billion liras," said TZOB President Şemsi Bayraktar in a statement on Feb. 8. 

Bayraktar noted that this calf death rate is below 5 percent in developed countries, far lower than the Turkey average. 

"We could decrease our costs to below 2 billion liras by establishing specialized village-based calf nursing farms," he said. 

"The only way to prevent such deaths is to establish village-based calf caring farms, in which baby calves are raised by professionals until a certain age and then handed back to their owners … Sellers who want to buy many calves can also apply to these farms. In this vein, income from calf production will also increase," Bayraktar added. 

Turkey started to become a net importer of meat in 2010 due to skyrocketing domestic meat prices. 

In 2016 alone the country paid $515 million for calf imports, according to the TZOB data.