soybean field

USSEC Elucidates Added Value Of U.S. Soybean Meal To Polish Swine Market Influencers

USSEC recently brought Dr. Jannes Doppenberg, a swine nutrition and feed manufacturing expert of Schorthorst Feed Research in the Netherlands, to Poland to work with selected swine production influencers.

USSEC consultant Dr. Jannes Doppenberg worked with Polish swine feed manufacturer LIRA-Pasze, which had just begun operating its brand new feed mill dedicated to Porcus brand piglet feed.
USSEC consultant Dr. Jannes Doppenberg worked with Polish swine feed manufacturer LIRA-Pasze, which had just begun operating its brand new feed mill dedicated to Porcus brand piglet feed

The project involved a tour of Poland by Dr. Doppenberg and Jerzy Kosieradzki, USSEC Technical Director - Northeast Europe, which aimed to illuminate the added value of U.S. soybean meal on a personal level to nutritionists representing key commercial feed and pig growing companies. For this endeavor, in-company meetings worked better than group sessions such as seminars or conferences because of language differences, but, most importantly, because trust and confidence need to be built before nutritionists are willing to discuss their feed formulation work in detail with “outside” consultants.
Among the customers visited was CEDROB, Poland’s largest chicken integrator, which is now expanding into integrating swine production. They already have 9000 sows, which has given them the possibility to develop a full line of piglet, pig, and sow feeds. They were shown in greater detail the added value of U.S. soybean meal in reducing production costs per bird and pig produced.
At LIRA-Pasze, a feed compounder, their main production is pig feeds, which represents 70 percent of total feed production. The company specializes in high margin piglet feeds (branded as Porcus) and manufactures piglet feeds for Cedrob. The company operates three feed mills. They have focused strongly on feed technology by using extruders. Although LIRA’s feed production is relatively low, they are the market leader in piglet feeds and the use of extruders. Convincing Lira to exclusively use U.S. soybean meal as a high quality soybean meal source in their piglet feeds will help to position U.S. Soy in Polish pig feed production.
Smithfield is by far the leader in pig production and meat processing in Poland, and Agriplus is their integrated pig growing company. Currently, they have 80,000 sows with plans to increase to 120,000 in 3-4 years and then to 145,000 sows. The largest sow farm they own has over 10,000 sows and they use 90 percent contract growers to finish pigs. They currently produce around 850,000 tons of feed a year and will need to expand as sow/pig numbers increase. They have feed mills and slaughter facilities all over Poland. Because they want to produce more antibiotic free pork, protein quality will need to be very high in order to keep the crude protein content as low as possible. The usage of higher quality U.S. soybean meal was recommended.

At Agriplus, Dr. Doppenberg (left) worked mostly with the company’s two technologists/nutritionists, Sylwia Kuśnierek and Maciej Bestyński. (Agriplus’s production facilities from the outside and inside are shown on the pictures in the background).
At Agriplus, Dr. Doppenberg (left) worked mostly with the company’s two technologists / nutritionists, Sylwia Kuśnierek and Maciej Bestyński. (Agriplus’s production facilities from the outside and inside can be seen in the background pictures)

Further professional discussions with these and other influencers of the Polish swine production sector about cutting edge swine nutrition and production know-how, including optimal utilization of U.S. soybean products and USSEC assistance, are planned for FY17.