USSEC Holds Poultry Roundtable for Maghreb’s Feed Industry in Morocco
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USSEC held a poultry roundtable for Maghreb’s feed industry in Maghreb in Casablanca, Morocco from May 10-12 as part of the organization’s FY15 promotion program in the Middle East / North Africa (MENA) region.
The U.S. Ambassador in Morocco, Dwight Bush, opened the conference, highlighting the importance of U.S. Soy in exports worldwide and its contributing value to economy. “The global demand for soy will continue to increase, and North Africa’s feed industry was recently recognized as one of the fastest growing feed regions in the world,” he stated. “That growth is due to the dynamic poultry and milling industries that are represented by all of you here today; and at present, Morocco and Tunisia are the largest buyers of U.S. Soy products in the Maghreb, placing these two partners among the top ten largest export destinations for U.S. Soy products.”
Brent Babb, Regional Director – Europe and Middle East / North Africa (MENA), covered the advantages of U.S. Soy and the importance of international markets such as Maghreb in the soy value chain.
Bob Metz, United Soybean Board (USB) board director, and Willard Jack of the American Soybean Association (ASA)’s board of directors, explained the latest developments in farming soybean crops on their farms to the audience. Sarah Hanson, Agricultural Attaché, and the two agricultural specialists in the Maghreb region confirmed that soy is the leading U.S. agricultural value product in the Maghreb.
The presentations of visiting experts focused on broiler performance developments in the next twenty years, and the resulting requirements in the feed industry. USSEC consultant and professor at the University of Arkansas, Craig Coon, presented integrators, feed and poultry producers’ data showing the advantages of using U.S. Soy as compared to soybean meal of other origins to the audience of traders.
USSEC consultant and director of Food Protein R&D Center at Texas A&M University Dr. Mian Riaz discussed extrusion process and the advantages of different products made of soybeans.
Mr. Babb and his staff, the MENA team and local Morocco consultant Khalid Benabdeljelil organized the conference, which was followed by field visits and meetings with customers in the Moroccan markets.
The team discussed several issues regarding the importance of high quality ingredients in turkey feed during a visit to the Sofalim feed mill. This group will produce at full capacity feed for 60 percent of the turkeys grown in Morocco. Discussions held at Alf Sahel, the largest feed mill in Morocco, focused on extrusion, equipment and extruded soy products and soy oil. Other talks at Alf Al Mabrouk’s new feed mill focused on NIR and other analytical means to assess SBM quality and supply.
During visits, the team highlighted the need to use high quality feed and ingredients such as U.S. hipro meal to obtain top performance.
The Maghreb is the largest market in the MENA region for U.S. Soy products. Last year, Morocco imported over 300,000 tons of U.S. soybean meal. Traditionally, Morocco has imported a large percentage of its soybean meal needs from the U.S. Today, the U.S. maintains a market share in Morocco’s soybean meal market of about 35 percent. 80 percent of imported soybean meal goes to the poultry feed industry. Poultry remains by far the main user of soybean meal in this area.