The 2020 China Dairy Industry Summit (D20) was held in Shijiazhuang, Hebei Province on Oct. 12. Vice Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs Yu Kangzhen delivered a keynote speech at the summit, and Chief Livestock Officer of MARA Ma Youxiang attended the summit.

The theme of this year’s summit was "Empower the dairy industry and offer health guidance in a shared society." The summit reviewed the experiences of past five years since the first D20 Summit and shared the achievements of China's dairy industry. The summit also released the 2020 Quality Report on China Dairy Industry, gathered outcomes of the China Milk Action project and launched the Three-year Action Plan for China's Top 20 Dairy Companies.

The summit reiterated the importance of seizing the opportunity to make the dairy industry a pioneer of China’s agricultural modernization. The summit also noted that it is imperative to promote high-quality development of the dairy industry through greater efforts and more practical measures; create a quality and safety monitoring system along the whole industry chain; and develop world-renowned dairy brands to help build a bigger and stronger industry.

In 2019, China's domestic dairy industry production was 32.976 million tons, up 3.8% year on year. The milk production registered 32.01 million tons with a 4.1% year-on-year increase, while the dairy product output hit 27.194 million tons, up 5.6%. In the first half of 2020, the raw and fresh milk output jumped 7.9% year on year despite the COVID-19 pandemic, and has become a bright spot of the agricultural and rural economy.