YOUR AD HERE »

Vilsack says trade mission ‘most successful’

In a telephone call to reporters from Chile today, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said that his trade mission to Peru and Chile this week is “perhaps” the most successful in the history of USDA and “certainly in the last seven years” of the Obama administration.

Vilsack noted that Peru had fully opened its market to U.S. beef and that one company had already sold “two containers” of beef. POET, a South Dakota company that builds and runs ethanol plants, has been “aggressively marketing” distiller’s dried grains (DDGs), the ethanol co-product that is used as a feed ingredient.

Vilsack said he had met with the agriculture ministers in Peru and Chile and with Chilean President Michelle Bachelet.



In addition to marketing American food products, Vilsack said his discussions with officials had included collaboration about climate change, food waste, and renewable energy.

USDA said representatives of these organizations and companies traveled with Vilsack:



▪ ADM Rice Inc., West Arbuckle, Calif.

▪ American Softwoods, Portland, Ore.

▪ APA – The Engineered Wood Association, Tacoma, Wash.

▪ Bell Carter Foods, Corning, Ga.

▪ Commercial Lynks Inc., Alexandria, Va.

▪ Cypress Food Distributors Inc., Coral Springs, Fla.

▪ Eastern Quality Foods, Ponte Vedra, Fla.

▪ Fall Creek Farm & Nursery, Inc., Lowell, Ore.

▪ Green Plains Inc., Omaha, Neb.

▪ Growth Energy, Washington, D.C.

▪ Hidden Villa Ranch, Fullerton, Calif.

▪ Hubbard Breeders LLC, Pikeville, Tenn.

▪ IncaBiz LLC, Omaha, Neb.

▪ JM Grain, Garrison, N.D.

▪ Klausner Trading USA, Inc., Myrtle Beach S.C.

▪ LL-International, LLC, Bismarck, N.D.

▪ Maryland Department of Agriculture, Annapolis, Md.

▪ MetaFoods LLC, Atlanta, Ga.

▪ Mirasco, Atlanta, Ga.

▪ Morgan Davis International, Macomb, Okla.

▪ POET, Sioux Falls, S.D.

▪ Pristina Capital Partners LLC, Midland Park, N.J.

▪ Renewable Energy Group, Inc., Ames, Iowa

▪ Renewable Fuels Association, Washington, D.C.

▪ Standard Cotton, Germantown, Tenn.

▪ Strickland Ranch and Exports, Myakka City, Fla.

▪ Tomex Foods, Inc., Glenn Ellyn, Ill.

▪ TRC Trading Corporation, Roseville, Calif.

▪ United Source One, Belcamp, Md.

▪ USA Rice Federation, Arlington, Va.

▪ U.S. Grains Council, Washington, D.C.

▪ U.S. Meat Export Federation, Denver, Colo.

▪ U.S. Soybean Export Council, Chesterfield, Mo.

▪ Zafi Beverages Inc., Bensenville, Ill.

–The Hagstrom Report