Council DDGS Promotion Efforts In Taiwan Lead To Increased Sales

Some of the new generation of livestock nutritionists in Taiwan lack of experience with U.S. distiller’s dried grains with solubles (DDGS). As a result, they are extremely conservative when using DDGS and do not properly assign the correct energy values, digestible amino acids and available phosphorus values for DDGS. Likewise, Taiwanese feed mills tend to use low inclusion rates of DDGS in animal feeds due to concerns with mycotoxins levels.

To better educate feed mill nutritionists, the U.S. Grains Council (USGC) used Market Access Program (MAP) funding to organize a variety of DDGS promotional activities in Taiwan in 2017.

The Council catalogued total tonnages of feed products produced, estimated tonnages of DDGS purchased, and the average percentages of DDGS used for 30 major feed mills in Taiwan. Based on this list, the Council selected major feed mills with low percentages of DDGS used and/or having potential for increased DDGS inclusion rates and arranged on-site consultations.

The Council worked with National Animal Industry Foundation (NAIF), feed mills, producer associations and appropriate universities to conduct 12 conferences, meetings and training courses for promoting the applications of DDGS over the course of the year. These activities included:

• Consultation to introduce the values and benefits of using DDGS in hog, poultry and aquaculture feeds and provide an update on mycotoxin and antibiotic residues in DDGS, in April 2017.
• Consultation to help promote DDGS by visiting 23 feed mills, presenting at eight seminars and writing two articles for Taiwan Feed Industry Magazine on the nutrition, quality and application of DDGS to feed mill technicians, hog producers and poultry producers.
• Organization of an eight-member U.S. Grain Production and Quality Study Team that visited POET Bio-refining in Laddonia, Missouri, where members acquired information on the production and quality of DDGS. One member of this mission subsequently placed a trial order with POET Bio-refining in November for 100 metric tons of DDGS.

Taiwan is now the 12th largest market for U.S. DDGS. U.S. DDGS imports in Taiwan increased from 212,997 tons in the 2015/2016 marketing year to 267,410 tons in the 2016/2017 marketing year, a 25.5 percent increase. The value of the increased sales of 54,400 tons of DDGS is estimated at $8.9 million.

The Council used $30,000 in MAP funds for its Taiwanese DDGS marketing program in 2017, generating a return on investment (ROI) of $297 per $1 of MAP invested.