Fish meal, Soy or Additives?

Fish meal prices are going through the roof, driven by a fear of reduction in the global supply of this important animal feed ingredient. As a result, poultry, hog and aquaculture producers around the world may find it difficult this year to find economical sources of protein for their feed, as the price of this protein-rich ingredient hit historic heights.

At the start of 2009, one metric ton of fish meal was around US$ 1,000. By the end of April 2010, it was already at US$ 1,937 with little chance of coming back down.

The source of the problem is the El Niño weather phenomenon affecting ocean temperatures in South America, the main production center for fish meal. For example, Peru, the largest exporter of fishmeal in that region, depends largely on the inventory of anchovy, but in the past El Niño has caused up to an 80% reduction in Peruvian fish stocks. Additionally, Chile suffered a major earthquake in February 2010 which impacted major processing plants.

Some feed producers are pushing for soybean meal as a substitute, which has been also rising heavily in recent years. Some others recommend corn.

Not to sound too self-serving, but this could be a good opportunity for animal producers to try protease feed enzymes such as Versazyme to increase protein availability of existing feed ingredients or use Valkerase to produce higher digestibility feather meal as a substitute for fish meal.

Big Hairy & Audacious - Ag Biotech Goal of 30 in 10

I recently attended the Biosciences Networking Event for alumni of NC State University's College of Ag and Life Sciences (CALS). Besides hobnobbing with NC Biotech Center President and NCSU alum Norris Tolson, CALS Dean Johnny Wynne, and my former Master's thesis advisor Dr. Eric Miller, I learned about the NC Biotechnology Center's commitment to add $30 billion to North Carolina's economy within the next 10 years by combining its strengths in traditional agriculture with new technologies from the biotech space. I'm not sure how you even measure adding $30 billion to the State's economy, but it certainly seems to be a big number.

To that end the NC Biotech Center has recently brought in Gwyn Riddick to lead the Ag Biotech program and Amber Shirley as Biotech Crops Director (interesting tidbit...Dr. Shirley did her Ph.D. work at Purdue University, under the guidance of current NCSU Chancellor Randy Woodson). Gwyn and Amber certainly have their work cut out for them. But if there is anywhere that has the chance to develop ag biotech, the Triangle area, with many of the major ag bio companies located here (Syngenta, Bayer CropScience, BASF, Monsanto, Pfizer Poultry), should have some good shots on that big hairy audacious goal.

A Timely Treatise on "Coopetition"

Ever wonder why there is always a Lowe's Home Improvement store near a Home Depot? Or why CVS and Walgreens always seem to be across the street from each other? There is a term in marketing known as "coopetition" - in which stores or businesses that compete against one another will co-localize in the same area under the assumption that a potential customers that goes searching for a particular store in the area might be lured away to a competing store and vice versa, but ultimately both stores profit because the presence of both stores drives more foot traffic which in turn potentially drives more sales. Hence "coopetition" - business cooperate and compete with each other in the marketplace. And it's not just bricks and mortar - think of how both Coke and Pepsi seem to have identical product offerings, yet both brands continue to thrive.

So it is with my company BioResource International, small growing biotechnology company promoting a novel enzyme feed additive for the animal nutrition market and DSM, big multinational conglomerate marketing a similar enzyme feed additive. Both of us have a protease-based feed additive on the market (Versazyme in our case, ProAct in theirs), and I like to think that we are in some sense "coopetitors" as they educate potential customers that in the future could be our customers and we educate potential customers that they could sell to in the future. What doesn't sit real well with me however, is their claim to be the "first pure protease enzyme feed additive on market", when they well know we were selling product at least a year before their launch in April 2009. I'm all for coopetition and enlarging the pie for all to share, but let's play fair.