Global demand is growing for the ethanol by-product distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS), which is used for livestock feed – and the US Grains Council is helping to move that product.

At the U.S. Grains Council’s International Distillers Grains Conference in Indianapolis earlier this week, attendees heard that Mexico currently holds the title as the number one purchaser of U.S. DDGS, importing 708,000 metric tons in the 2007 calendar year. Canada follows in second place importing 317,580 tons last year. But other countries hold promise for increased imports, including Thailand and Russia.

Grains Council president and CEO Ken Hobbie said at the conference, “DDGS and its value in all types of animal rations shows that US grain producers have the capacity and the capability to produce for both food and fuel.” Hobbie said that if the four million tons of DDGS exported from the US this year were divided equally between all the major livestock food sectors it would produce 331,000 metric tons of chicken, nearly five billion eggs, almost 86,000 metric tons of beef, 1.8 million metric tons of milk and 205,000 metric tons of pork.

Listen to Hobbie’s remarks here, provided to DomesticFuel by Hoosier Ag Today:
[audio:http://www.zimmcomm.biz/ag-group/usg-hobbie.mp3]