The company, a subsidiary of the Masan conglomerate, said that the VND613 billion ($26.4 million) deal would add chilled chicken to its product portfolio. Until now, the only chilled meat product that it has been producing is pork.

Chilled meat is different from frozen meat, with the former stored at temperatures of one and four degrees Celsius to preserve its juiciness and freshness, while the latter is stored at a deep freezing temperature of below -18 degrees Celsius.

3F Vietnam, established in 2014, is one of the pioneers in the "feed – farm – food" model seeking to provide chilled fresh meat to users via retail chains.

The company targets a revenue of VND1 trillion ($43 million) this year.

Masan MEATLife will distribute the chilled chicken in over 1,700 retail outlets comprising its VinMart and VinMart+ chains and other supermarkets.

Masan MEATLife also inaugurated Saturday its VND1.8 trillion MEATDeli Saigon Meat Processing Complex in the southern province of Long An. The project’s first phase will supply 140,000 tonnes of chilled meat per year, also producing 15,000 tonnes of processed foods like ham and sausage.