Corn trade in the 2015/2016 marketing year saw a two percent volume increase over the previous year. That’s good news for corn growers since increasing overseas trade is a key way to help agriculture deal with low commodity prices. Marri Carrow with the U.S. Grains Council says it’s an important and exciting time to be working in trade.
“In my region (Western Hemisphere) we had the 2015/16 increase was about six percent. Mexico, Colombia, Peru remain significant corn markets,” she said, but “the more exciting Central America has proven to be and that’s continuing to increase. At the Grains Council we talk a lot about where the potential is and where can we can capture more market, and the market is there, right in our backyard with Central America, with the Caribbean and our major reliable markets.”
She talks about some of the programs the U.S. Grains Council runs to help spur those markets to import more corn.
“We just completed our global trade conference, the Export Exchange in Detroit, and these types of conferences we’re able to put buyer and seller together and they can make relationships, they can make actual trade happen. But the success is when they come home and they have the relations and they have the contacts and they’re able to get some additional pricing or options on whatever they might have. These types of programs are essential to U.S. grain trade. It’s not that we’re suggesting grain trade wouldn’t happen without these types of programs, it just provides a very good platform for both importers and exporters to expand their contact portfolio.”
Carrow says it’s important for farmers to pay attention to the western Hemisphere when looking at the markets, nearby regions that rely on the U.S. for grain, and in turn good customers that farmers need.
Carrow is the Director of the Western Hemisphere Office for the U.S. Grains Council.
Learn more about the work of the U.S. Grains Council online at www.USGrains.org.
Source: NAFB News Service