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As China's dairy consumption grows, both the domestic milk production and the importation of dairy products are increasing to meet demand. As a first step toward understanding the environmental impacts of water use in the expanding Chinese dairy industry, life cycle assessment (LCA) was used to calculate the water availability footprint for large-scale production systems in Heilongjiang, a major production region. Comparisons were also made with imported products from the US (California) and New Zealand. The water footprint of milk (cradle to farm gate) produced in Heilongjiang was around 11 L H₂Oe (H₂O-equivalents) kg⁻¹ fat-protein-corrected milk (FPCM). This compared to 461 and 0.01 L H₂Oe kg⁻¹ FPCM for production in California and New Zealand respectively. Accordingly, the water footprints of milk products (cradle to factory gate) produced in Heilongjiang were much lower than those imported …