Indonesia imports 1,300 cows from Australia in ambitious dairy plan

Indonesia imported 1,383 more cows from Australia this week, agriculture officials said on Monday, as part of an ambitious $3 billion plan to woo small farmers to join efforts to quadruple dairy output.

Jakarta, contending with limited funds, is pushing private companies to fund the purchases, an unorthodox step that has fuelled concern among businesses in Southeast Asia's largest economy, Reuters reported last year.

"These cattle are not only an addition to the population," Agung Suganda, the ministry's director general of livestock and animal health, said in a statement.

"They are a strategic investment to strengthen the foundation of national milk production from smallholder farms."

The centrepiece of a free meals programme covering 83 million children and expectant mothers, the plan calls for imports of a million dairy cows over five years to boost numbers from 220,000 now.

The ministry said the cattle imports comprised joint shipments and breeding, involving cooperatives and farmers since last year, with their milk yield set to flow into the processing industry to ensure certainty of supply.

The latest shipment of dairy cows faces quarantine and disease checks after arriving on Sunday in the city of Cilacap in the province of central Java, said Hendra Wibawa, an animal health official at the ministry.

"To ensure safety, a 14-day quarantine period will be ... followed by sample collection to detect diseases such as lumpy skin disease and foot-and-mouth disease," he added.

Lunar Chemplast, a private company, imported 1,094 animals while Mazaraat Lokanatura Indonesia bought the rest, he said.

Indonesia imported 33,955 cows in 2025 13,544 of them as dairy animals and the rest destined for beef, the ministry added.

-Reporting by Bernadette Christina; Writing by Ananda Teresia; Editing by Gibran Peshimam and Clarence Fernandez/Reuters