Bunge closes US soy processing plant

Bunge North America announced that it is discontinuing soy processing and related plant operations at its facility in Danville, effective April 23.

The facility will continue to handle soy as a grain elevator, as well as the co-located corn mill will remain open.

''We are faced with a soy processing market that has more capacity than required and to operate all of our soy processing assets as efficiently as possible, we made the difficult decision to discontinue soy operations at Danville,'' said Mark Van Emon, vice president and general manager, Bunge Oilseed Processing.

Meanwhile, Bunge has made investments in its core businesses by starting construction on an export grain elevator in the US and a soy processing plant in Vietnam, and by acquiring Raisio's margarine businesses in Finland and Poland. These additions are expected to boost Bunge's ability to supply growing markets in Asia and tap into new markets in Europe, while improving the company's overall efficiency.