USSEC China recently organized a group of executives from major Chinese pig farms, feed millers, and feed additive companies to travel to the U.S.  The delegation visited the Midwest cities of Des Moines, IA; Lincoln, NE; Sioux Falls, SD; and Pipestone, MN to get an overview of the U.S. livestock industry.  The group also attended the World Pork Expo in Des Moines and participated in a weeklong training course at South Dakota State University (SDSU).  Representatives from Wens Group, Huanshan Group, and Xinjiang Tiankang Food Co., Ltd. were among the companies that visited the U.S. from June 5-17.

The World Pork Expo provided opportunities for the group to establish solid business contacts within the U.S. agricultural industry.  Team members also were able to learn about modern equipment and facilities such as stainless steel feeders; drinkers and gestation / farrowing stalls; and other advanced techniques as shown at the Expo.  Most team members believed that the Chinese livestock industry will need to be more adaptive to the changing market if such modern and advanced technologies are to be introduced to China in the near future.
Team members who attended the training course on practical swine feed technology presented by professors and experts at SDSU learned about ventilation systems and disease eradication approaches, among other topics.  Many team members expressed their intention to apply these technologies in their operations to boost their production and felt strongly that the consumption of soy by the Chinese swine industry would be further increased with the adoption of these new technologies.
Following this training, the Chinese swine study team visited several swine and soy farms, feed mills and a packing plant, which all demonstrated modern U.S. agriculture that features high efficiency, less labor, widely adopted automation in crop and livestock production and product processing.  These visits displayed the development of the U.S. swine industry, but also helped to validate the quality and supplies of U.S. soy and the services provided by the U.S. soy industry.
USSEC China Animal Utilization (AU) Director Richard Y. M. Han, AU Technical Consultant Sam Shi and AU Program Manager Sunny Zhang escorted the team on this trip.  The Chinese team members expressed their future interest in participating in USSEC’s technical and marketing activities.