There’s a good export market for dehydrated timothy hay, but prairie farmers don’t seem to want to grow it, one exporter says.
“Canada can do better,” said Blair Wright of Transfeeder Ltd., in Olds, Alta.
His company has been exporting dehydrated timothy hay bales to Japan and other parts of Asia from plants in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.
Wright said Japanese buyers are willing to pay $10 to $20 per bale more for timothy bales than for alfalfa bales – the most expensive dehydrated bales they buy.
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On average, timothy producers have been paid $140 a tonne in Alberta and $110 in Manitoba.
This may surprise people who think of alfalfa as more valuable because of its higher protein content, but the Japanese want timothy because of the long fibres.
Growing their own
Wright’s company has had to deal with timothy shortages by growing its own hay in areas such as the Peace River region in Alberta.
The Asian currency meltdown has hurt Korea’s buying power, but his company is still sending 15 containers per week there.
Ninety percent of Transfeeder sales are to Japan, which has had only a 15 percent currency devaluation, but the overall crisis “certainly woke us up to some of the risks.”
The strong Asian demand for dehydrated forages comes from the region’s dairy industry, which has almost two million cows. That’s as many dairy cows as in Canada, but there is little domestic forage supply.
The Japanese have had to import to meet their forage needs, buying heavily from the United States, Canada and Australia. Japan imports about 6.7 million tonnes of forage per year, he said.
In the dehy bale market, the U.S. has an overwhelming share, Wright said.
In 1996 it sold 1.18 million tonnes of dehy bales, compared to 88,000 tonnes from Canada and 48,000 tonnes from Australia.
Wright said Canadian exports do well in the Japanese market because of a “perception of higher palatability.”
If prairie farmers grow more timothy for the export market, and producers keep improving the quality of the hay, Canada should be able to increase its share, Wright said.
