October 20, 2006

Millers buy India, Argentina soybean meal

Some 45,800 tonnes of soymeal from India and Argentina and a separate 5,400 tonnes of soybean from Argentina were imported by local Asian feed millers to provide raw materials needed for feed processing.

A total of 17,300 tonnes of Indian soymeal was imported for delivery between Dec 15, 2006 to Jan 15, 2007 through US-based agri-business and food company Bunge at US$236.75 per tonne.

Another import was made from Argentina which included 28,500 tonnes of high protein soymeal to be delivered in December-January. This was bought through Starcom Resources at per short ton.

Soybean from Argentina was purchased at US$2.40 per bushel to be delivered in January next year.

With this, country's soymeal import reached 1 million tonnes, still lower than about 1.3 million tonnes last year. Feed millers on the other hand expanded their feed wheat import bringing it to 1.1 million tonnes as against 500,000 tonnes last year.

Corn importation also grew about four times this year reaching 220,000 tonnes compared to 55,000 tonnes last year. In spite of the bigger corn import this year, feed-millers continued to buy local corn as it was cheaper.

Holders of MAV (minimum access volume) who were yet to avail their quota also found it cheaper to buy local corn. While first class corn was sold at P10.50/kg, lower quality corn could be obtained for less than P10, a trader said.