Poised to overtake Thailand's position as the number four chicken exporter, a Venezuelan default sends export volumes plunging. What a difference half a year makes. Our last article described exports as the Argentine broiler sector's 'safety valve' -but now, that valve has unexpectedly snapped shut.

Drought, high beef prices and a dairy marketcrash induce steep decreases in output and exports. Although 2014 turned out better than was expected for Australian beef cattle, this year is seeing the industry pay the price for an expansion based on unsustainable supply-side fundamentals.

The specter of PEDv makes for record returns in 2014 and a strong production growth this year. Caught between PEDv's disappearance and a rising US dollar, low prices and an oversupply situation could be developing. An excellent recovery year is ending for America's swine sector.

Recession, flat consumption and dimming trade forecast overwhelm a cheapening currency's cost advantages. Once a booming BRIC economy, worsening economic conditions are forcing Brazil's beef cattle farmers to become export oriented.

As it returns to its pre-2008 growth path, foreign participation in the China's dairy industry is shifting away from dairy powder imports and back to capital investment. Over the past year, China's dairy industry has re-taken its place as this country's fastest growing livestock line. Five years of stagnation caused by 2008's melamine contamination crisis are now over.

America will not suffer anything like Thailand's decade long ban from major importing countries but a vaccine could make the outbreak far worse than it already is. Dogged by falling chicken prices and a rising, export hindering US dollar, an intensification of late 2014's bird flu outbreak was just about the last thing US broiler meat exporters needed.

Once primarily defined by the soy importing needs of its vast feed sector, China's economic weight is now lighting a fire under the cost of red meat.

War, geopolitics put an end to booming Russian and Ukrainian exports, leaving the country's swine sector without a source of export-driven demand. What a difference two years makes. After watching its exports rebound over several years, by 2013, Brazil appeared to have finally recovered from its post 2005 EU ban following a foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) outbreak.

A promising 2014 turns into a sour new year as fluctuating energy markets cut demand from leading importers. Six months ago, it was thought that Russia's ban of European and American chicken would briefly boost Brazil's broiler export growth close to levels last seen at the turn of the decade. This however, was not to be.

An industry analyst cites at least two factors why Indonesia's animal feed industry is headed for the good times.

In the feed-milling industry, technology and innovation spell the success or failure of a company. Some companies lead, others trail behind, depending on how it adapts to the needs and demands of the industry. We take a look at how three companies are trail-blazing and making the industry all the richer for their technologies.

The one-time beef export king still retains all its natural advantages. Amid falling feed costs, Chinese buying interest and peculiar cattle fattening practices, all a new government has to do is get out of the industry's way. Both from a short-term perspective and for a long time before that, things have not been going well for Argentina's beef cattle sector.

With the country's most dynamic livestock line finally regaining its momentum, torrid import growth will become yesterday's story. Despite the spectacular increases in the production and consumption of other red meats, China's dairy industry has been an under rated top performer.

In less than a decade, China has veered from protein self-sufficiency to become a leading buyer in world swine, beef and dairy markets. Whether by its dependence on American and Brazilian soy or fast growing imports of red meat, Chinese feed and livestock's growing foreign dependency is a two-way street, as western agribusiness exporters are becoming just as dependent.

A rebounding anchovy population, slack European buying interest and cooler ocean currents point to softer prices ahead, but technical indicators imply that its long-term uptrend remains firmly in place. A combination of seasonally low winter time demand and hope has levelled out a formerly hyper inflating fishmeal market.

Not only has poultry feed consumption fallen,Far Eastern demand for milk and red meat is likely to make ruminant demand grow more strongly than anticipated. For years, government policymakers and agribusiness analysts of all stripes have been forecasting chicken and broiler meat's inevitable ascendancy.

Chicken consumption failed to take off but more pork than expected is being consumed as the pace of consolidation accelerates. Although Asian agribusiness remains dominated by China's feed and livestock sector, the latter did not develop as was anticipated.

Although late January and early February featured an impressive dairy market upturn, prices remain far below their 2013 highs, and do not have much scope to rise higher. It fell more than anyone expected but after several false starts and a Russian boycott, the world dairy market is finally rebounding, if only to form a strong market bottom.

A succession of supply and demand shocks have dented output growth but underlying fundamentals remain strong. Having said that, the means and locus of feed milling's expansion is also changing.

Feed industry leaders took advantage of their presence at the International Production & Processing Expo (IPPE) 2015, now being held at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, to discuss critical issues facing the feed sector, especially those involving government regulations.

Booming incomes and population growth are coinciding with societal changes that boost demand for high-end dairy products by 10% or more annually. Unfortunately, a relatively slack supply-side response implies that painful policy decisions must be made.

Emerging leading importers, newexporters chip away at world poultry's export duopoly, change demand growth dynamics. Despite a spate of bird flu outbreaks and Russia's boycott of western meat imports, it has been a good year to raise broilers. Amid scarce red meat supplies, high broiler prices and falling feed costs, strong gross margins were enjoyed by producers in America, Brazil, Russia, Japan and India.

Despite declining statistical indicators, market signals imply that American cattle inventories are finally reversing their long, 40 year decline. -Now can someone please tell the country's consumers that there's more to beef than just burgers?

Cornered by bird flu and unusually weak late year swine output, China faces an unprecedented second consecutive yearly fall in feed production. After falling 3% below 2013 levels in the first half of 2014, weak late 2014 livestock markets will probably see China's annual feed output fall by at least 2%.

Once famous for its steak, Argentina exports nearly 100% more chicken as it does beef. With domestic consumption levelling off, the sixth largest exporter needs to keep climbing up world market rankings. Brazil may be Latin American poultry's face in most of the world but in South America, Argentina's broilers are more likely to come to mind.

Once the country's most promising meat line, scandals and disease have brought poultry's production and consumption growth to a standstill. In a country where feed and meat consumption have charged forward like a locomotive, China's third consecutive year of flat or falling broiler consumption and output is unprecedented.

The country's beef cattle industry rose and fell in inverse step with the Canadian currency. While American cattle are boxed in by parched pastureland and low domestic demand and Brazil is exchanging its feed surplus to augment its competitive advantage in red meat exporting, North America's number two red beef exporter has problems of its own.

Two years ago, there was essentially just one HPAI (highly pathogenic avian influenza) virus we were really watching - H5N1. True, there were some lesser avian viruses out there - including H9N2, H5N2, and H7N7 - but none of these were viewed as posing a major public health threat.

With fortune finally going their way, lessons learned during their bird flu crisis are being used to their competitive advantage. Ever since Saha Farms went broke and Thailand's trade with Europe and Japan was liberalized, the Thai broiler sectorhas enjoyed over 1.5 years of strong, but cautious prosperity.

An abundance of feed, horrid transport logistics and Asian beef demand are transforming Brazil's agribusiness export profile. Although 2014's export volume remains a hair below the 2.1 million tonne record set in 2007, market forces both inside and outside Brazil are putting its beef sector on its strongest growth path since the mid 2000s.