Astarta launches 1,200 cow dairy farm

Astarta (AST PW) launched a new dairy farm to host 1,200 cows, the company reported on Thursday. The farm should be operating at full capacity since early 2012. The company’s cattle headcount was 11,000 cows as of end-2010 and management plans to increase that to 13,000 at end-2011. Yegor Samusenko: Astarta is the largest producer on Ukraine’s fragmented raw milk market, though this segment accounts for less than 9% of revenues and 6% of EBITDA in 2011, according to our estimates. This new farm should add less than a percent to both the top and EBITDA lines of Astarta.