"Not long ago our delegation came back from China where we discussed the issues of beef supplies. Very soon two companies, these are Mogilev Meat Packing Plant and Veles Meat, will start their supplies.

"We are busy with expanding the list of companies that can supply products to the Chinese market. I hope we will do it before the end of the year. In the first quarter of the year we are planning to launch the exports of poultry meat to China," said Aleksei Bogdanov, as reported by BelTA.

According to Mr Bogdanov, this year Belarus launched its exports to Asia – the markets of Vietnam and Hong Kong. "In January-September 2017 we supplied beef and poultry meat worth of more than $1 million to these markets," he added.

The 2nd international export forum Belarusian Meat is taking place in Minsk on 25-26 October with the assistance of the Agriculture and Food Ministry.

The forum discusses such topical issues as export diversification, competitiveness in foreign markets, setting quotas for export deliveries of poultry meat products, cooperation with Belarusian meat processing companies, strategies for obtaining the Halal certificate and the specifics of working with halal products, the prospects for creating a unified information environment for veterinary, biological and food safety.

Among the guests of the forum were managers and representatives of large wholesale companies specializing in the supply of meat and meat products to the markets of China, the United States, Russia, Kazakhstan and Iran.