USSEC attended the 4th International Conference World Soy Feeds 2018 organized by the Publishing House “SFERA”, in St. Petersburg, Russia in late May.
The unique project “World Soy Feeds Conference” is currently the largest European event dedicated exclusively to soy and one of the main annual agricultural events taking place in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) for local soybean crushers, feed millers, and livestock companies. Initially, the project was dedicated mainly to Russian and CIS customers, but due to the importance of soy and the excellent organization of the conference activities, the event grew and attracted customers from several European countries. This fourth edition was attended by about 300 delegates from more than 15 different countries.

The event’s main goal is to disseminate the latest international experience and to discuss the current situation and perspectives of development of the global and Russian soy and feeds markets; soy cultivation, processing and efficiency of soy usage in feeding; quality control matters; and the latest industry innovations. This year, the program of the conference included the following main sessions: statistics, analytics, prospects of the global and Russian soy markets; deep processing of soy: the formation of value added products chain; problems and development of soybean seed selection and production; livestock and fodder production as the main consumers of soybeans and soybean meal; and soybean processing: equipment and technologies.
The conference also offered broad possibilities of interactions with top managers of professional unions, feed mills, and livestock companies, and with traders to receive valuable information about perspectives of development of the Russian soy industry, feed, and livestock markets and global soybean and protein markets dynamics.

David Leishman, ATO Director, from U.S. Embassy, Moscow joined the event as a keynote speaker and gave an interesting presentation on the global and U.S. Soy industry development. Mr. Leishmann delivered a clear message for cooperation between soy suppliers and customers as a key solution for efficient animal production.
A USSEC delegation formed by Russian, Polish, and Romanian customers and consultants attended the two-day conference with the goal to learn about and update the current soy market in the region, soy consumption trends in Russian Federation, and how U.S. Soy access to the market should be improved.
As a Gold Sponsor of the event, USSEC had a booth, where displayed leaflets featuring the quality of U.S. Soy and USSEC’s mission and activities flyers were distributed among visiting conference delegates. Dr. Maria Domoroshchenkova, USSEC consultant for the Russian Federation, played an instrumental role in facilitating fruitful interactions between the Eastern European delegation and Russian soy and feed industry counterparts. The conference favored discussions with industry colleagues and proved that besides being a platform for sharing technical information, the World Soy Feeds event is an opportunity to meet new industry friends, suppliers and customers.