A 10-member Japanese Feed Industry Distiller’s Dried Grains with Solubles Pelleting Team attended a short course at Northern Crops Institute April 20-24. The course, “Distiller's Dried Grains with Solubles: Nutrition, Use and Feed Manufacturing,” taught participants how to incorporate distiller’s dried grains with solubles, a co-product of ethanol production, into high-quality pelleted feed for poultry, swine, beef, dairy and aquaculture.
Team members represent companies utilizing 80 percent of distiller’s dried grains with solubles imported by Japan, according to the U.S. Grains Council that sponsored the team. Japan imported 198,000 metric tons of U.S. distiller’s dried grains with solubles in 2008, an increase of 114,000 tons from 2007, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service.
Kim Koch, Northern Crops Institute Feed Production Center manager, coordinated and lectured in the course. Koch also led the team during feed pelleting instruction and demonstrations at the institute’s feed center.
“Japan is one of the largest importers of distiller’s dried grains with solubles in Asia, and judging from the interest this team had for livestock nutrition and production information when using distiller’s dried grains with solubles, there is every indication that those imports will increase,” says Koch. “The training this team received in nutrition, production management and feed manufacturing using distiller’s dried grains with solubles will enable them to promote the many positive benefits. The team interacted with professionals from the ethanol industry (large and small); recognized academicians from NDSU, South Dakota State University and the University of Minnesota; and had some hands-on pelleting experience using distiller’s dried grains with solubles. The team witnessed the multi-disciplinary paradigm of today's animal agriculture at work – from field to finished product,” Koch said.
Hiroko Sakashita, associate director of the U.S. Grains Council in Tokyo, escorted the team. The U.S. Grains Council also brought a distiller’s dried grains with solubles feed team to Northern Crops Institute in 2008.
“Since the members have been studying the production of pellets with distiller’s dried grains with solubles at their own companies, this workshop contributes to their development of better pellets with a higher inclusion of distiller’s dried grains with solubles. This will ultimately invite further growth in the consumption of U.S. distiller’s dried grains with solubles in the Japanese market,” says Sakashita.
Guest speakers included Sally Noll, University of Minnesota; Mark Whitney, University of Minnesota Extension Service; Vernon Anderson, NDSU Research Extension Center; and Kurt Rosentrater, U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service, Brookings, S.D.
April 30, 2009