What do you do with the goat milk?
We sell the goat milk to customers. We also offer home deliveries; people will call up and order. We do not sell the milk to super market, we sell directly to customers.

Could you please tell me a little bit about your farm?
I have almost thousand goats in my farm, all are mountain goats, coming from Minnesota, America. I have 5 workers to assist me in daily work.

How long have you been in this business?
I have been in this business for almost 14 years since 1988. Before running this farm I have had a pig farm raising pig, chicken, duck, crocodile. After the government phased off the pig farm in 1984, we started the pilot project for a goat farm in and moved to Lim Chu Kang in 1996. So my whole life is with livestock.

Could you tell me more about your pig farm before you started your goat farm?
It was started by my father, and was originally allocated in Punggol. My father started with chicken hatchling in Kallang then we went into farming until now.

Have you faced any competition from other farms?
No, because there is no other goat farm in Singapore.

Could you please tell me about your early days when you started your goat farm in Singapore?
The farm was at first started by 4 of us, 4 brothers in my family. However, after 5 years (1996-2000), two of my brothers were all too tired and one by one left the farm, ending up with only me and another younger brother to run the farm.

We had a lot of difficulties in early days setting up the goat farm. Since we only had experience in pig farming, we had to learn, to adapt ourselves to goat farming. After we closed down the pig farm in 1988, we spent many years doing the pilot project to study about goat life in Punggol. We shifted here in 1996. It's very difficult to learn how to take care of them, in what way it is comfortable and suitable for them.

Since we are the first one to introduce goat milk in Singapore, we faced a lot of difficulties in early days. Singaporeans are used to drinking cow milk, not goat milk.

Have you thought of the risk you have to take when introducing goat milk in Singapore?
Yes, we were taking the risk, we were gambling to start this business. What we thought was that goat milk is much better than cow milk. So we would rather take the risk, to play with the game, because if you don't try nobody will know about goat milk.

Why did you choose goat milk, not cow milk in the first place?
Because cow milk can be found anywhere in the market, not goat milk.

Why did you choose the mountain goat from America? Could you tell me more about this kind of goat?
This mountain goat was recommended by help of government side PPD (Primary Production Department) now we call it AVA (Agri-food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore). We studied together and chose the suitable kind of goat to raise in Singapore. My brother also went to US to have a look at different kinds of goat, and finally chose mountain goat.

How did you start your business? How can you get the financial support for your farm?
We started with a very small farm. In the beginning, we had to use hands to milk the goat. Everything is done manually until we have a little bit money to buy simple machines not the big ones as we are using now. From there we save up and gradually set up our farm until it is as today.

We started with the compensation from the government when they phased it off.

How did you introduce your product to customers?
We have had RC and school people to organize the educational tour - a farm visit. From then we educate them what goat milk is, how good it is and let them try the milk. So people have a chance to understand the benefit of drinking goat milk and try goat milk, in that way, they will introduce goat milk to their friends and relatives.

Do you do marketing for your product? Why?
We do not do much marketing because we don't have much milk to offer. Once you market out you should ensure to have enough supply. We are just a small farm so what we do is just slowly introduce to consumers. Five years after we started our business, we joined STB and introduce the goat milk not only to consumers but to tourists through the farm visit as well.

So how is your business now compared to it in the early days?
At the moment we still manage to cover our cost, around 5 to 7 years back I can not cover myself. I could sell 300 plus liters on average every day, in the beginning we cannot even sell 50 liters.

How is your annual income?
It's up and down and depends on the customers. However, for the past two years it has been improving since Singaporeans are now more aware of goat milk.

How old were you when you started your business?
I was 35 years old.

Have you formally educated in animal life before?
No I have not studied anything about animal life. All of this is through my experience since I'm 9 years old. I learned from my father during the days with the pig farm.

Setting up a business at the age of 35, could you get any advice or help?
Yes, I got advice from AVA, from my family and from my own experience. In the first 5 years, we had a lot of problems, we had to do everything by ourselves, even building the barn for the goats because we did not have enough man power. In the daytime we do the daily work, in the night time we build the barn. Four of our brothers worked hard together.

Why did you choose take all the risk to be an entrepreneur? Why did you not choose to work for others?
I have spent all my life taking care of the livestock, I started at very young age, at 9 years old, to help my father. So I don't know much, it's not easy for me to change to other job. And I love farm life, to me farm life is very enjoyable, as long as you enjoy what you are doing you will like it. I've have committed my whole life to farming. There are no holiday for me, I work 366 days, not 365 days, including Chinese New year days.

I don't like to work for others because I want something on my own. After all the difficulties, when looking back I have got the reward for my self. That's is my own farm, a success in my life.

Is it too much tiring for you to work every single day, 366 days in a year?
Tiring is another thing but you need to work hard in Singapore, otherwise you can not survive.

Have you ever felt too tired and wanted to give up in the first few years? What did you do then to get over it?
Yes, we have. We tried to sit down and figure it out together. We could hardly survive because it was very hard to educate the Singaporeans to use goat milk. We had to give back all the milk we have to the baby goat, we could hardly sell them because nobody wanted to buy. We thought it was because everybody was scared of the smell. However, those sheep milk has the smell, not this kind of mountain goat. We gave them free samples to try but they did not even want to try.

By biting my teeth. You were already in and you had no choice. If you gave up that would finished, nobody wanted to take over, nobody knew how to take over the farm, since livestock is not easy to be taken over. So I tried to keep persistent, trying to go and fight for it. Luckily, I got over those obstacles.

So after all the difficulty times, what values do you think have helped you to be successful?
The value is that I dare to do what I want to do and I would only go through it if it's worth what I pay for. And my success is partly thanks for the help of organizations like AVA, STB, and Spring Singapore, otherwise I can not get what I have today.

What do you think of the entrepreneur spirit of Singaporeans?
I think there are young ones in Singapore that really want to try however the opportunity is not much. Some don't even know where to look for. It's much more difficult now. In my time, people can set up a small firm with a quarter million, nowadays you need half a million for a hawker center. People need much more money to start a business in Singapore now. And the family is getting smaller. Without the financial support from family, only with their bare hands I don't think they can start their business on their own unless the government provide more fund to support the entrepreneurs.

Do you think you have any advantage to do farming in Singapore?
I don't think I have any advantage. Singapore is more of a commercial land, more buildings and HDBs. We have to support ourselves, we have to import machines and livestock from overseas. Doing farming in Singapore is not easy.

What is the process of pasteurizing the milk?
First you have to filter the milk, then chill out the milk at 4 degree Celsius, then you heat up the milk at 75 degree within 15 seconds and then cool down the milk again. All the process is fully automatic.

What advice will you offer to those young ones who want to go into farm life?
For the young ones who want to go into farm life, you should prepare yourself to work hard every day and even nights. Hard-working, commit yourself and love animals. Nowadays, it's advisable for you to get a degree about livestock. In short, dare to do whatever you want , work hard and enjoy it, that's it.

To be successful I had a lot of support from my family: my wife, my children and my sister. I mean family support is very important in farming life.

Do you have any plan for coming years?
I want to bring in more goats from overseas, produce more milk, more publicity for Hay Dairies. My aim is to open two small shops in town and maybe in hospital. More specifically, I plan to bring more goats and open a shop in Children Hospital in the year 2003.

Student Interviewer's Personal Comment