USSEC participated in the international soy conference, “World Soy Feeds,” in Saint Petersburg, Russia from June 3-6. United Soybean Board (USB) director Bob Metz of South Dakota and American Soybean Association (ASA) director Bill Wykes of Illinois traveled to Russia with USSEC Regional Director – Europe and Middle East / North Africa (MENA) Brent Babb to attend the conference. USSEC technical consultants Dr. Gonzalo Mateos and Dr. Iani Chihaia joined the group under the coordination of the USSEC local consultant, Dr. Maria Domoroshchenkova. The delegates also paid a visit to Kalingrad’s Sodrugestvo Company a day before the event in Saint Petersburg.

During the two-day event, the grower leaders and USSEC consultants gave four presentations with the goal to promote and demonstrate the quality of U.S. Soy, showing U.S. Soy’s commitment to Russian soy customers and end users. Besides sharing technical knowledge and information related to farming practices in the U.S., the conference provided a unique opportunity to interact with professionals from Russia’s commercial feed, poultry and swine integrators.
The keynote speaker, Thomas Mielke from OilWorld, provided attendees with a clear message about the future trends of world soy production and consumption and the impact of the potential development of the Russian livestock industries.
Dr. Chihaia stated, “Poultry production has increased almost overnight due to the modern broiler genetics today. Pork and beef will take a little while longer until Russia’s domestic meat production will created self-sufficiency. The next thing Russian feed and livestock industries have to focus on is improving efficiency by reducing the animal’s growth period through more efficient feeding programs and use of high quality soybean meal.”
Dr. Mateos said, “Russian feed and livestock sectors are quite clear on the growth trend and goal to be less independent on meat from the rest of the world. Their aim is to reduce its meat imports in 2020 by two-thirds, compared to the volume they imported last year. That will mean they will import less animal protein and more vegetable protein. This will generate more business for U.S. Soy exports for the coming period.”