Vietnam is likely to make a major shift in its imports to soy from soymeal by the middle of next year, a senior industry executive said Thursday (Apr 29).

"Once Bunge's soy crushing plant in Vietnam becomes operational, which is expected by the summer of 2011, then the country will import more soy instead of soymeal," said John Lindblom, regional director of the American Soybean Association-International Marketing.

Vietnam currently imports around 2.5 million tonnes of soymeal annually, while imports of soy are merely 150,000 tonnes.

Bunge's upcoming plant will have a daily soy crushing capacity of around 3,000 tonnes, which traders said could push up Vietnam's soy imports annually to almost 1 million tonnes and proportionally drag down soymeal imports.

Bunge, in a joint venture with Japan's Itochu Corp. and STX Pan Ocean, is also building and will operate a state-of-the-art export grain terminal at the port of Longview in Washington, which is likely to be operational by the middle of next year.