Russia's growing livestock industry to find US DDGS useful
Russia's livestock and poultry industries are growing "very rapidly" and would require more DDGS to maintain robust production, Alex Kholopov, U.S. Grains Council (USGC) consultant in Russia, said Monday ( Oct. 20, 2008).
Kholopov said prior to the Russian government's focus on agriculture, it was near impossible for livestock and poultry operators to borrow money for longer than a year.
Today, the Russian government has afforded the industries with loans for up to eight years with zero interest.
Russia's poultry industry is now growing 16 to 18 percent annually, the fastest growing agricultural sector in the country, he said.
At the same time, Russia's swine industry, previously dominated by backyard farmers, is seeing a trend to a more modernised industry similar to the US, he said.
Kholopov said the swine industry has doubled in two years and will likely continue to grow at this pace, increasing the likelihood of the industry to consume nearly all domestically produced corn. As a result, leaders in Russia's poultry industry are looking to US DDGS.
Dmitry Lvovich, assistant to the general director of OGO Group, one of the top three companies in Russia in terms of elevator capacity, livestock feed output and poultry production, is attending the Council's International Distillers Grains Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana in hopes of finding a US supplier of DDGS.
Lvovich said the co-product was very price competitive and added that when a reliable supplier is identified, OGO will work vigorously to get the U.S. company registered to export DDGS to Russia.
Currently in Russia, the livestock and poultry industries consumes 18 million tonnes of feed ingredients, with 60 to 70 percent going into poultry rations.
Kholopov said Russian poultry operators will likely include DDGS into rations at 7 to 8 percent initially, adding the Russian poultry industry could import approximately 500,000 tonnes of US DDGS within the next two to three years.
