Southeast Asia’s imports of distiller’s dried grains with solubles (DDGS) between January and February 2010 showed a 73 per cent year on year increase, the US Grains Council has announced. In 2009, the region imported 890,000 metric tons of the ethanol co-product, accounting for 16 per cent of the US total DDGS exports, up from 590,000 tons in 2008.
The reason behind the growing number is Vietnam’s rising demand for DDGS across all sectors, including the aquaculture industry. According to USGC regional director in Southeast Asia, Adel Yusupov, aquaculture feed producers see DDGS as a high-value feed ingredient complementing soybean meal products in high protein aqua diets. In addition to DDGS, Yusupov also referred to the potential market for US corn gluten meal use in aqua feeds due to the product’s importance as a methionine source.
“From livestock to aquaculture, producers in Southeast Asia have come to realize DDGS keeps feed costs low without affecting feed quality and animal performance,” saidYusupov. “The magnifying demand in the region can be attributed to the council’s customer education efforts such as feeding trials and one-on-one meetings with end-users.”
According to Yusupov, the council is currently focusing on DDGS promotion to the Indonesian and Vietnamese dairy sectors as each holds huge potential for DDGS use.
“The growing interest in DDGS in Southeast Asia spells promising news for US farmers. The US Grains Council has certainly fulfilled part of its mission by promoting a new product to the Asian region,” said Charles Ring of the Texas Corn Producers Board and USGC Asia Advisory Team leader. “We have moved beyond simply making the price attractive to buyers and are now at the point where the product, because of its high quality, is selling itself.”
Ring said the mission is not over, however, and stressed the importance of continuing to promote DDGS to buyers and end-users in Southeast Asia. Other regional developments reveal a first-ever shipment of 858 tons of DDGS to Cambodia in February, due to the presence of at least 10 Thai and Vietnamese operated feed mills.
Meanwhile, the US Grains Council, in partnership with USDA’ s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS), is sponsoring several DDGS seminars and trade conferencs in Japan and China in June 2010. The council has extended an invitation to US DDGS exporters and producers to attend these seminars to initiate face-to-face introductions with foreign end-users and importers.
Japan Workshops, held from June 13th to 19th, will be held in Tokyo, and in two livestock industry areas, Hokkaido and Miyazaki. The council will provide attendees with updated information on supply and demand, export availability and transportation of DDGS.
It will provide updates on the ongoing feeding demonstration in Canada of high inclusion rates in beef using US DDGS. The council expects attendance of approximately 80 participants at the Tokyo seminar and 30-50 in other cities.
China Workshops, held from June 19th to 26th, include two one-day workshops in Fuzhou in Fujian Province and in Nanjing in Jiangsu Province.
These workshops coincide with small trade shows hosted by US DDGS suppliers. The council will arrange for a table for each supplier member to let them show their samples and talk with the customers during breaks and other times set aside a for mini-trade show. DDGS suppliers will need to bring their product samples, including the detailed chemical and physical analysing reports and the information of its availability and prices, etc, and be ready to sign export contracts if possible.
The council expects 70-100 participants at each workshop, including traders, feed and livestock end-users as well as government officials in each region, and some local international traders.
Those interested in attending should contact Kimberly Karst at
