January 25, 2011
Japan''s Chubu Shiryo cuts corn use in animal feed
Chubu Shiryo Co Ltd, a Japanese feedstuff manufacturer, has begun using less corn in some animal feed as the price of the grain continues to hike, a company official said Monday (Jan 24).
The move will not immediately affect the volume of Japanese corn imports, the official said, though this could change when the company starts reducing corn volumes in a broader range of feeds.
Food inflation has risen to the top of the agenda for many policymakers with memories still fresh of the 2008 food crisis, when soaring prices sparked riots in several countries, high inflation and in several cases deep trade deficits.
Chubu Siryo started shipments of feed for egg-producing chickens this month, with the use of corn cut to 30% from 50%, the average mix in compound feed for chickens in Japan, the official said. It plans to extend the move to feed used for pigs as well, although the official declined to set a timeframe for this.
The company raised the ratio of alternatives, primarily corn meal and wheat bran, without damaging the nutrition quality, helped by a processing technology the company has developed to improve the cost of processing feed from meal, he said.
"Our improved processing facility has enabled us to beef up the recyling of meal, which we hadn''t been done previously, as a way to contain the cost of rising corn prices," the official said, adding that the company aimed to eventually reduce the use of corn to around 10%.
Japan''s annual compound feed output is about 24 million tonnes. About 40% of compound feed is for chickens and 25% for pigs.
The latest data showed that Japan''s total compound feed output stood at 2.145 million tonnes in November, up 3.8% from a year earlier.
Japan is the world''s biggest importer of corn, the main ingredient in animal feed in Japan, importing about 12 million tonnes annually. The US is its main supplier of corn for feed use, while Japanese corn production is negligible.
CBOT corn for March delivery was at US$6.60 ？？ on Monday (Jan 24). The corn price has been climbing steadily since last summer when it hovered around US$3.6 a bushel. Corn prices hit a record high around US$7.65 a bushel in June 2008, then slipped below US$3 in late 2008 after the collapse of Lehman Brothers triggered a severe global economic slowdown.
The yen''s strength has so far helped contain a rise in Japanese domestic food prices, but some companies have begun passing the higher commodity prices on to customers.