Feed millers: Animal feeds production to wane by 2010

Feed millers have revised their output projection for this year, saying animal feeds would go down by 23 percent to 5 million metric tons (MT) from 6.5 million MT. "Production was down for lack of demand. Hogs production not only failed to pickup but in fact was depressed due to a slack in the production of piglets," an official of the Philippine Association of Feed Millers Inc., who refused to disclose his identity, said Thursday. Also, the official said aquaculture production has decreased by 5 percent, dragging the demand for animal feeds. Earlier, the sector projected the production to contract 10 percent, but weak demand for feeds prodded most feed millers to further cut production in order minimize losses. "Poultry was our only saving grace, if not for the good performance of the poultry sector we'll [be] out of business now," the source said. Feed millers said the industry remains persistent not to bring in additional corn despite a projected shortfall in production due to lackluster demand for animal feeds. Corn importation in 2010 is expected reach not more than 80,099 MT, a lot lower than the 344,945 MT imported in 2009. "Should there be a surge in demand [for feeds] towards year-end, we might import additional feed wheat but not corn. We can book November for December arrival," the source said. In 2009, feed millers shipped around 1.1 million MT of feed wheat into the country. For 2010, the contracted volume was about 1 million MT due for arrival until October. The private sector projected that feed wheat importation for the year may reach 1.5 million MT. —JE, GMANews.TV