USSEC consultant Dr. Craig Coon, animal nutrition professor at the University of Arkansas, traveled to Tunisia from May 18-21 to attend the Poultry Nutrition Seminar in Hammamet, as well as the Mediterranean Exhibition of Animal Production, Livestock and Agriculture Equipment (PAMED). During his trip, Dr. Coon had the opportunity to visit three plants with USSEC Country Representative - Tunisia, Dr. Riadh Karma:  NUTRIMIX, Tunisia's largest feed mill; Green Label Oil (GLO), a new extrusion plant recently build by Poulina Group Holding; and NUTRICAP, a feed mill belonging to Taissir / Al Baraka Group.

The extrusion plant is a very important new tool and a nice acquisition for the Poulina Group Holding to satisfy its needs in full fat soybean meal, soybean oil, and express soybean meal. The total capacity of this extrusion plant is 4oo metric tons (MT) per day. The storage capacity for soybeans has reached around 45,000 MT in metal silos.
During the field visits, Dr. Coon discussed capacity optimization with the Nutrimix/GLO staff and gave them several suggestions regarding feed nutrition and feed quality.

Dr. Coon also visited NUTRICAP at Grombalia; this plant has a 10 MT per hour capacity, as well as a storage facility of 4,500 MT for grains and 4,000 MT for soybean meal.

This visit provided Dr. Coon with a good opportunity to learn more about the level of Tunisia's feed industry level and how U.S. soybean meal is perceived by Tunisian customers.