LAZAREVSKOYE, Russia -- In order to enter Lu Binzheng's pig farm, visitors have to dress in white lab coats, stand under an ultraviolet light to kill any germs and slosh their shoes in disinfectant.
Lu, a 37-year-old Chinese farmer from the town of Tsyamusy in China's Heilongjiang Province, opened his farm in this village two years ago, following an invitation from the director of a struggling collective farm 87 km south of Birobidzhan, capital of the Jewish Autonomous Region in Russia's Far East. And he is serious about protecting his pigs from disease.
Lu and 11 other Chinese nationals run the 300-pig enterprise. He leases the land from the collective farm and employs Chinese mechanics, a veterinarian and a translator who communicates with Russian peasants hired to do field labor and clean the pigsty. It is one of three Chinese-run pig farms in the region, and Lu invested $10,000 to remodel the farm and buy pigs in Russia to get it going.
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