Grains Council Corn Mission | Japan

By Kelly Brunkhorst, Director of Research for the Nebraska Corn Board

I recently traveled with the U.S. Grains Council on the 2011 Corn Mission to Japan, China and Vietnam, which also included a stop in Korea. This blog will be one of three in a series about the mission, starting with Japan.

Over the nearly two weeks of the mission, we traveled approximately 20,000 miles, spent approximately 60 hours in an airplane or airport and saw four different countries.

Japan is a very formal country that has been a solid customer of US corn for a long time. We met with various trade associations representing the feed trade, starch and sweeteners and feed manufactures. We also had meetings with the ATO office, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and Zennoh. We had tours with Kushiro Silo (port facility), Tokachi Factory (feed manufacturer) and Oono Farm (beef cattle operation). These took place either in Tokyo or on the northern island of Hokkaido.

There seemed to be a common theme with the associations. First was the concern of future corn supply. They have begun to import from the Black Sea area, but still want the US to be a reliable supplier. It was great to have producers visit with them first hand about their outlook on yields and production. Secondly, the issue of protein came up constantly and took us all by surprise. We nearly apologized after the third meeting and they let us know that they have been bringing this issue up for over a year now. The third issue was around some anti-ethanol sentiment that utilized some of the same anti-ethanol statements we hear in the States. Last, the issue surrounding the 2009 corn quality is still brought up.

Japan is also the one country that we heard from on the mission that still imports a fair quantity of non-GMO (genetically modified) corn.

Within their livestock industries, they seemed to be profitable. The one beef operation was interesting. They were very transparent with the cost of production when making sales. The producers, both Holsteins and F1 crossed Holsteins and Waygu beef. This was a top-notch operation that sells the cattle under both a branded product and through slaughter facilities. Interesting that they feed the cattle out to around 1700 lbs and getting between $5000 - $7000 per head.

Japan is continuing to make improvements in their ports through an initiative to update them to handle the post Panamax vessels once the Panama Canal expansion is complete.

The last issue that was also brought up was the discussions of Japan entering into the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). Everyone that we discussed this with were against it, although some thought there may be some advantages to them, but didn’t outweigh the concerns.

Japan, as does Vietnam, has a big concern on China becoming a big importer of corn and how it may shift the dynamics in the industry.

Find more pictures on the online Flickr photo album, here.