By Kurt Shultz, U.S. Grains Council Regional Director of the Americas

With the growing potential for distiller’s dried grains with solubles (DDGS) usage in the Dominican Republic, the U.S. Grains Council organized two DDGS promotion seminars to the livestock industry in Santiago and Santo Domingo. It is estimated that the Dominican Republic could utilize 200,000-225,000 metric tons of DDGS per year, which is a stark difference from its current utilization of only 13,000 tons in 2011.

The Council seminars addressed many aspects of DDGS including production, quality control, nutritional value, and its value and use in animal feeding, including saving opportunities in formulation. Currently the Dominican Republic feed industry produces approximately 1.8 million tons of finished feed per year. More than 70 percent of this feed goes to the poultry sector.

These seminars demonstrated that many of the Dominican Republic’s key producers and manufacturers are ready to make the step towards utilizing DDGS. Current high corn and soybean meal values in the Dominican Republic have triggered an increased interest in the usage of DDGS. Even with DDGS values trading at a premium to yellow corn, there are still savings to be earned in final feed costs by incorporating this co-product into formulations. Various examples of different feed formulations were also discussed, taking into account current costs of local raw materials in the Dominican Republic and participants realized the value DDGS could bring to their formulations.

The Council’s efforts are already producing business leads. A group of 5-7 key feed manufacturers expressed interest in wanting to evaluate combining their potential DDGS volume and bring a hold of DDGS (5,000-6,000 tons) on one of the future vessels arriving from New Orleans. The Council will continue to work with buyers to turn such opportunities into sales.