For the first time since 2007, Peru has resumed importing distiller’s dried grains with solubles (DDGS), the U.S. Grains Council reports. A shipment of 5,000 tons at an FOB value of $1 million arrived during the first week of January, breaking a dry spell of imports due to a misclassification of the product by the Peruvian government four years ago.

Due to negotiations between the Peruvian government and the U.S. agricultural attaché in Peru, the issue was only resolved last year.

The buyer of this most recent shipment, San Fernando, is Peru’s largest poultry company importing more than 600,000 tons of corn and soybean products with 43 percent originating from the United States in 2010. The company is currently working to formulate DDGS into its poultry rations with a target inclusion rate of 6 percent.

San Fernando has expressed great satisfaction with its experience using the feed ingredient thus far and the Council will continue to work closely with them as they begin to use the ethanol co-product.

“The Council has been promoting DDGS use to San Fernando since 2002 when the Council had its first regional co-product promotion activity in Panama,� said Kurt Shultz, USGC director for Latin America and the Caribbean region. “It’s good to see the doors are now open once again for imports.�

Shultz will meet with San Fernando and other potential importers and end-users in Peru and Ecuador next week in an effort to expand opportunities for U.S. DDGS in the two countries.