China will provide 180 million yuan (US$26.4 million) in subsidy to dairy farmers in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, a senior official said on Wednesday.

The subsidy was aimed to help farmers who were badly hit in the tainted milk scandal and sometime had to dispose of raw milk, said Guo Qijun, vice chairman of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Regional People's Government.

Inner Mongolia is China's largest dairy base with 2.5 million dairy cattle. About 800,000 families in the region raise the animals.

Among the subsidy, 100 million yuan came from the central government and the rest from the regional government, Guo added.

The central government last week set aside 300 million yuan to help dairy farmers nationwide.

Yili and Mengniu, two Inner Mongolia-based dairy companies and bellwethers of the domestic dairy industry, realized 40 billion yuan in sales revenue last year and had targeted 60 billion yuan this year.

"The target is very hard to realize this year as the two companies are seriously affected in the crisis," Guo said. "What is important is we have drawn a lesson from the crisis. I have confidence in the future of the dairy industry in Inner Mongolia."

Also on Wednesday, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine published a national standard for instant melamine testing on raw milk.

The Administration also said the latest tests found that Chinese liquid dairy products met the new temporary restrictions on melamine.

It was the 11th investigation on the industrial chemical following the tainted baby formula scandal that killed at least three infants and sickened more than 50,000 others.

So far, 5,253 batches of liquid dairy products from 132 brands produced after September 14 were tested and all in line with the limit, it said.

Melamine, often used in the manufacturing of plastics, was added to sub-standard or diluted milk to make the protein levels appear higher.

Last week, the government set temporary limits on melamine content in dairy products. The limits were a maximum of 1 mg of melamine per kg of infant formula and a maximum 2.5 mg per kg for liquid milk, milk powder and food products containing at least 15 percent milk.

(Xinhua News Agency October 16, 2008)