A team of Vietnamese government officials and grain importers have been traveling with U.S. Grains Council (USGC) staff throughout the United States for the past week to learn about insect control for distiller’s dried grains with solubles (DDGS). 

The team, comprised of Plant Protection Department of Vietnam (PPD) officials, major feed and livestock integrator companies, trading groups and an agriculture-focused journalist, visited Kansas, Minnesota and Washington, D.C., where they learned about a variety of pest risk mitigation strategies geared at minimizing the financial burden of fumigation costs. 

With a population of roughly 93 million, Vietnam is currently the sixth largest importer of DDGS in Southeast Asia. However, regulations around insect control could threaten the continued exports of DDGS and other grains as heavy costs associated with fumigation are passed on to end-users. Current shipments of DDGS require fumigation and, while that will likely continue, the trip was chance to show stakeholders alternative strategies. 

Stops on the trip included visits to a container loading facility, an ethanol plant, a tour of the National Grain Center and a Federal Grain Inspection Service (FGIS) lab, meetings with the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection (APHIS) and a Food Protection Services short course on insect identification, risk assessments, fumigation and grain storage. 

Below is a photo tour of the trip.

Team members tour container loading facility in Kansas City, Kansas.


The group visits Lansing Trade Group corporate headquarters for a market and fumigation discussion.

A visit to a FGIS lab gave stakeholders insight into the grading and inspection process.

Team members tour the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Grain Center.

The team meets with members of the North American Export Grain Association (NAEGA) in Washington, D.C.

Click here for more photos from the trip.

For more information on the Council’s work to promote DDGS and other grains in Southeast Asia, click here.