Beijing Capital Agriculture Group, which is centered on the city's major milk supplier Sanyuan Group and two poultry product makers, opened for business on Saturday.

Sanyuan has absorbed the asset of Huadu Group and will manage the operation of Beijing Dafa Chia Tai Co., the other party in the regrouping, Xue Gang, general manager of the new company, told a press conference to mark the event. He served as chief manager of Sanyuan.

Total assets of the new company reaches 15 billion yuan (US$2.2 billion) with the employee total nearly doubled to 40,000. The diary group alone has a company asset of 10 billion yuan.

Sanyuan will serve as the listed company of the new agriculture group, according to the deal.

The regrouping would help enhance the company's capacity in fields such as poultry raising, food processing, and bio-medicine development, according to Xue.

Group President Zhang Fuping said the new company will make full use of the capital market and seek more ways to raise capital.

In March, Sanyuan acquired the core asset of Sanlu Group at 616.5 million yuan, which went bust in the wake of the baby milk scandal that left six children dead and some 300,000 children sickened. It later gained 95 percent of the shares in Sanlu's company in Shandong Province for 49 million yuan.

Sanyuan was one of the few large dairy producers whose products had been tested as being clear of melamine contamination.

"One of our major task at this stage is business restructuring. We will not rule out the possibility of purchasing other assets," Zhang said.

Huadu and Dafa, the other two parties of the new company, were two major domestic chicken product suppliers.

(Xinhua News Agency May 17, 2009)