San Miguel Corporation and Toyota Tsusho are in talks for to jointly acquire the Mariveles Grain Terminal in the Philppine province of Bataan, located on the island of Luzon. The Mariveles Grains Terminal is a major getaway for bulk handling of feed commodities such as grains, flour, soy and corn. Its acquisition is worth approximately P1 billion ($22.7 million) and could be sealed anytime soon.

Under agreements with the state's Philippine Ports Authority and Bataan's provincial government, publicly listed port operator Asian Terminals Incorporated (ATI) holds the right to develop and operate the terminal for 20 years until 2013. The contract is renewable for another 20 years. Details of the proposed acquisition were not disclosed. It did not say if ATI will sell its rights over the entire property or over a part of it.

CPF to build grain terminal with 1.2 million - tonne annual feed capacity

Thailand's Charoen Pokphand (CP) is building a grain terminal in Nakorn Ratchasima in order to benefit from its proximity provided to nearby corn-producing in the country's northeast.

The terminal, with a storage capacity of 200,000 tonnes would be the company's biggest integrated feed operation with a capacity to produce 1.2 million tonnes of poultry feed a year.

UK aquafeeds company Kiotech has opened its first representative office in China in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, the country's aquaculture capital.

The opening of the office in China, which accounts for 70 percent of all aquaculture production in the world, is a major step forward for Kiotech, said director Mark Nicholls. Opening this office enables the company to apply for and hold product registrations that protect the intellection property developed for its range of Aquatice fish feeding attractants.

Kiotech will use this facility to manage new product development through laboratory and commercial farm trials, Nicholls said. The company is also currently involved in commercial trial and development programmes in Thailand and China in close association with the Regional Government Fisheries Institute and with UK government agency CEFAS (Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science).

The trial involves the application of Aquatice for both adult and juvenile tilapia in Guangdong fish farms as well as for white shrimp and catfish in trials, the latter two both conducted in Thailand. All of these yielded positive results.

Nicholls said the trials demonstrated crucial environmental benefits with significantly improved water quality in Aquatice treated ponds.  

DuPont unit launches Y-series soy varieties
 

Pioneer president and DuPont vice president Paul Schikler said the Y-series will have the potential to add about 19-million bushels of soy to American production of this legume.

Pioneer said it would launch enough seeds to plant about nine million hectares of the Y series soy in this new soy breed for 2009.  

Tyson to invest in Chinese poultry processor  

Tyson's Shanghai country manager James Rice said the framework agreement is currently pending government approval. Financial details were not disclosed at the time of publication.

Tyson's plans to acquire a majority stake in China's fifth largest poultry processor comes hot on heels of the company's recent acquisition of a new chicken processing and packing plant in Shanghai. The new plant is slated to sell 40 million chickens yearly to the thriving Yangtze River Delta market.