The farm where cows are milked and fed "with the help of solar panels"

When they had surplus dairy products, Elena Pavlov would sell them at the local market, where the future entrepreneur started to make her first clients. Her dairy products began to be appreciated and increasingly in demand, so the family bought a few more animals every year. The entrepreneur ended up owning 50 head of good dairy cows.

"There were no jobs in our region. Having three children, we had to feed them and send them to school. I didn't want my husband or myself to go abroad, so we decided to work here on our farm," remembers Elena.

Over the years, the family has invested the money from dairy production in equipment to make their work on the farm easier. From a young age, the family's children were involved in the business, but as they grew up, they moved away from home. Only daughter Violeta, 29, left Chișinău for the Zăicani farm.

"I love animals, just like my mom. I used to work in Chișinău and on my days off I came home to help my parents. Lately I've seen that it's harder for them, I'm getting older and I need to get more involved. I came back home and I'm working on the farm. So, what if I finished law school?" says Elena's daughter.

Farmers sell their dairy products at the market, deliver them to clients or get them from home. In a single day, the Pavlov family's cows produce 350 liters of milk. The entrepreneurs refuse to give the milk to the dairy because of the very low price offered by the collection points, so they needed cold storage and a milk cooling tank to store the milk.

The energy crisis two years ago also hit this farming family. With high electricity prices, monthly bills were two or even three times higher. Cold rooms, fridges, milking machines, which were very old, consumed a lot of electricity.

Thanks to the help of the Austrian Development Agency through the UNDP project "Emergency support for agri-producers in the context of the socio-economic, climate and energy crisis", the entrepreneur was able to purchase solar panels with a capacity of 8 kW, a milk cooling tank and two milking machines. 

"This support means a lot for us. It's the first support we've ever won. It helps us a lot because we have a lot of machines connected to electricity. Even the feed for the animals we make on some electric feed shredders. The cooling tank was old and used a lot of electricity. The money we save, we will invest in expanding the business, we want a big production room where we can package the products," says Elena Pavlov.

Now the farmers produce sweet cheese, salted cheese, cream and fresh milk. They want to open their own shops and sell tasty and healthy products all over the country.