USSEC conducted the 20th Feed Technology & Nutrition Workshop (FTNW) focusing on swine and poultry nutrition and feed technology in Manila, Philippines from August 4-7.  Topics included the fundamentals of feed technology and the latest research results on soybean meal quality from all over the world.  The three day workshop was conducted by USSEC Southeast Asia, in cooperation with Dr. Hans Stein, a leading researcher and professor from the University of Illinois, with support from the U.S. Grains Council (USGC), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the South Dakota Soybean Association.  More than 110 international nutritionists and feed producers from all over Southeast Asia attended this conference.
Led by Dr. Stein, five speakers from the U.S., Canada and South Korea presented and discussed 23 technical papers on swine and poultry nutrition and feed technology during the two-and-a-half days of lectures.  The last half-day of the workshop was dedicated to break-out sessions that tackled feeding programs and production management of swine breeders and piglets, layer production and nutrition management, and broiler nutrition and management for maximum performance.
The workshop aimed to help nutritionists and feed producers understand and apply the latest findings in swine and poultry nutrition and feeding research.  Dr. Ravi Ravindran of Massey University (New Zealand) shared an important presentation, discussing the most recent results from bioassays of different soybean meal origin, which showed that U.S. soybean meal gave higher metabolizable energy (ME) and digestible amino acids (DAA) compared with meal from Argentina, Brazil and India.  The average of 16 samples of U.S. soybean meal gave higher values of 148, 58 and 375 kcal/kg over Argentine, Brazil and Indian soybean meals respectively.
Together with the higher values on the most essential amino acids for swine and poultry, these results gave price advantages of approximately U.S. $30.39, $12.23, and $77.24 per metric ton (MT) for U.S. soybean meal versus Argentine, Brazil and Indian meals respectively, on the basis of apparent metabolizable energy (AME) and total lysine and methionine.  This information encourages more nutritionists and feed producers to update their soybean meal nutrient matrices to take advantage of the higher nutrient values of U.S. soybean meal and for purchasing personnel to look for higher nutrient quality in soybean meal beyond price per MT.