ASA WISHH’s January trade team to Cambodia and Myanmar is building on WISHH’s ongoing work with current and potential customers of U.S. soy for both human food and livestock feeds. In Myanmar, WISHH is growing demand for U.S. soy in the human food market while the U.S. Soybean Export Council (USSEC) is leading the animal feed and aquaculture sector work. In Cambodia, WISHH implements both U.S. soy food and feed strategies, including a U.S. Department of Agriculture-funded Commercialization of Aquaculture for Sustainable Trade (CAST) – Cambodia project.

WISHH led the trade team of 13 U.S. soybean growers along with representatives of four U.S. food grade soybean exporters and two exporters of U.S. commodity soybeans. Participating companies have reported to WISHH that they made meaningful connections for future trade.

The growers and exporters shared information about U.S. soy protein quality, availability and reliability. During the U.S. soy conferences in both Myanmar and Cambodia, United Soybean Board Director David Williams, who serves as an ex-officio member on the WISHH Program Committee, presented on the steps U.S. farmers take to produce food grade soybeans like the ones he has grown on his family farm in Michigan.

USDA support of the trade mission and other USDA initiatives, such as the Quality Samples Program, have allowed WISHH to leverage soybean checkoff resources, including WISHH’s work with Southeast Asian food companies that send employees to checkoff-supported WISHH trainings at the Northern Crops Institute in Fargo. A 2019 study projects Asia will be home to 65 percent of the world’s middle class by 2030 so protein demand will grow for livestock feed and human foods like tofu.