October 11, 2011

 

Vietnamese feed producers face raw materials deficiency

 

 

A deficiency of raw materials has resulted in difficulties among Vietnam's local animal feed producers as production mainly relied on imported materials, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

 

A ministerial report revealed that around 70% of raw material used to produce feed in Vietnam was imported from the US, India and Argentina.

 

It was noted that the volume of domestic corn could meet only 70% of demand, soy supply satisfying only 5-10%.

 

With the use of imported raw material, domestic feed prices have been affected by world figures.

 

Furthermore, when importing raw material, feed manufacturers had to pay transportation costs, causing prices to be around 15-20% higher than usual.

 

To solve the problem, the Vietnam's Animal Feed Association suggested that the government push the development of raw material locally.

 

Additionally, the government was called on to boost technological investment to curb the importation of expensive machines.

 

Association chairman Le Ba Lich proposed that farmers be given financial support, including low interest rates, to enable them to upgrade store systems and improve the quality of agricultural production.

 

In this way, Vietnam could limit its dependence on imported raw material, Lich said.

 

Currently, Vietnam has 233 feed manufacturers, of which around 50 are foreign-invested and 11 are joint ventures. The remaining firms are all domestic.

 

Foreign-invested companies dominate 60%of the entire market share.

 

While in the first nine months of this year manufacturers managed to produce 7.9 million tonnes of feed, it is expected that, in the last quarter, an additional four million tonnes will be added to the figure.