On Monday, December 25th, China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs (MARA) released an update on its efforts to reduce soybean meal use as feedstock.
For the first 11 months of 2023, China reduced its use of soybean meal as feedstock by 4.44 million metric tons (MT) compared to the same period last year, a year-on-year (y-o-y) decrease of 11%. This occurred despite the total output of feedstock nationally being 286.9 million MT, an increase of 4% y-o-y.
MARA projects that the demand for soybean for feed in 2023 will decline by 9.1 million MT and the proportion of soybean meal used in feed will drop 1.5% y-o-y.
MARA unveiled a three-year action plan this year to reduce soybean meal use in animal feed. The measures include exploring alternative protein feed resources, switching out grain for grass, and reducing the proportion of soybean meal in feed. In 2022, the proportion of soybean meal in animal feed was 14.5%. The plan calls for a 0.5% reduction each year, which will decrease the proportion to less than 13% by 2025. The plan was developed to combat food stability concerns as most of China’s soybean imports are from Brazil and the U.S.
