Thursday, April 22, 2021

"Reshaping grain trade? China moves to change animal feed recipes"

So much of this stuff, energy, food, New World Order etc. leads back to China that having passed on the opportunity to learn Mandarin is turning into a real hindrance viz. the Climateer Master Plan For World Domination.

From Reuters, April 21: 

China issued guidelines on Wednesday recommending the reduction of corn and soymeal in pig and poultry feed, a measure that could reshape the flow of grains into the world’s top corn and soybean buyer.

China’s corn prices surged more than a third in the most recent year following a drop in output and state stockpiles. The country started importing a lot more corn to compensate for the domestic deficit. So feed makers have already been switching to cheaper alternatives, especially wheat.

Benchmark corn and soy futures on the Chicago Board of Trade notched fresh multi-year highs on Wednesday, so China’s new guidelines may not do much in the near term to temper soaring feed costs.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said in a statement on its website the new guidelines are aimed at improving the usage of available raw materials and creating a formula that better suits China’s conditions.

China consumes about 175 million tonnes of corn in animal feed each year, and that should increase as more livestock is raised on intensive farms using industrial feed.

The country also imports close to 100 million tonnes of soybeans to crush into soymeal for animals, agriculture ministry data shows.

The ministry said rice, cassava, rice bran, barley and sorghum were also suitable alternatives to corn, while rapeseed meal, cottonseed meal, peanut meal, sunflower meal, distillers dried grains, palm meal, flaxmeal, sesame meal and corn processing byproducts were good options to replace soymeal.

The guidelines may only affect firms that were not already keeping up with the trend towards substitution, Li Hongchao, senior analyst at trade website Myagric.com, said.

Greater feed use of wheat, which has more protein than corn, has already cut demand for soymeal.

A wheat products trader, however, said it could have “a significant impact”.

“Many feed producer clients are still using quite a bit corn. They have reduced the usage but haven’t cut off corn completely,” he said, declining to be named because he was not authorised to speak with media....

....MUCH MORE