flour Archives - U.S. Wheat Associates

Egypt, flour, Foreign Agricultural Service, Foreign Market Development, GASC, hard red spring, hard red winter, pasta, U.S. wheat, U.S. Wheat Associates, U.S. wheat exports, wheat farmers Hard Red Spring, Hard Red Winter

Pasta Represents New, Growing Opportunity for High-Protein U.S. Wheat in Egypt

The competitive situation in Egypt’s large wheat import market for subsidized bread led USDA Foreign Agricultural Service cooperator U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) to reduce its presence in Egypt in 2017. However, USW has identified a niche opportunity for U.S. hard red spring (HRS) and hard red winter (HRW) in Egypt’s growing demand for pasta.

According to Euromonitor, at an annual value of more than $843 million, Egypt is the world’s seventh largest pasta market and ranks ninth largest in consumption. Because it is popular and affordable, pasta consumption will grow by 5 percent in the next five years Euromonitor predicts. Acceptable quality pasta requires higher protein wheat than Black Sea classes can provide alone, so USW targeted industries and companies interested in sourcing higher quality flours and is investing funds from the Market Access Program (MAP) in trade and technical servicing to encourage those companies to demand quality flour from private flour mills.

For example, USW met with the largest Egyptian pasta manufacturer to demonstrate how to adjust their flour specifications to improve their premium products. USW made recommendations that would target flour from HRS for the company’s long goods pasta products. USW also worked closely with specific milling companies to show how blending U.S. HRW or HRS with Black Sea wheat would help improve the quality of and income from their pasta flour products.

An Egyptian trading company serving these millers purchased 50,000 MT of 12.5% (12% moisture basis) protein HRW in 2018/19 specifically as an ingredient for pasta flour. And while the premium pasta maker did purchase flour produced from Australian wheat to hold down its costs, it worked with its flour supplier to import U.S. HRS in December 2018 and signaled its intention to purchase more HRS.

USW also advised Egypt’s government grain purchasing agency, GASC, to issue a specific tender for 12% protein HRW for the government’s subsidized pasta program, another large potential niche market. GASC is currently testing HRW samples sent by USW through the Quality Samples Program to determine if HRW meets their requirements.

In addition to the 50,000 MT of HRW specifically imported for pasta flour, in marketing year 2018/19 Egypt imported 49,500 MT of HRS, benefiting U.S. farmers in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana, as well as U.S. wheat export supply participants. A trade service visit to Egyptian private sector mills and buyers in April 2019 confirmed they will continue to consider U.S. wheat as an ingredient in their high-quality products, especially pasta.

June 2, 2018/by Erica Oakley

The export market development programs administered by USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service are highly successful partnerships with U.S. farmers, ranchers, dairy producers and small food businesses. U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) and the Washington Grain Commission (WGC) are leveraging that partnership to increase demand for soft white wheat in Guatemala.

Over several years, USW and WGC have worked together to educate decision makers at commercial bakeries and food manufacturers in Latin America about the benefits of low protein soft white (SW) wheat. WGC provides direct funding from its checkoff program and USW uses funding from the Market Access Program (MAP) and Foreign Market Development (FMD) program.

In 2013, USW sent an expert in “premix” consumer bakery products to work with an innovative and growing Guatemalan flour mill and wheat foods company. The consultant helped the company set up a small plant to develop formulations for chocolate and vanilla cake mixes as well as pancake and corn bread mixes using flour from U.S. SW wheat. After extensive quality testing and production refinement, the company has now successfully launched these branded consumer products through a large Guatemalan supermarket chain.

With direct producer funding, USW also worked with WGC to conduct a seminar with the same company designed to show how blending flour from U.S. SW and other wheat classes can improve end-product quality while reducing flour costs compared to competing wheats. Milling consultant Andrea Saturno and USW Technical Specialist Marcelo Mitre demonstrated several different blending proportions and conducted bake tests at the company’s own laboratory. The company continued trials on its own and chose a blend of 50 percent SW and 50 percent U.S. hard red winter (HRW) wheat that it successfully markets as an industrial bread flour.

In addition, the company says its two largest flour customers now purchase SW-based flour to manufacture branded cookie and cracker products. One of the customers recently built a new cookie factory that represents an opportunity for USW to expand its technical assistance.

Such end-user success and growth creates an opportunity to continue expanding annual SW exports to Guatemala of almost 130,000 metric tons per year, valued at more than $25 million, making Guatemala the largest SW volume importer in Latin America. Total U.S. wheat commercial sales to Guatemala in marketing year 2017/18 exceeded 527,000 MT.

May 1, 2018/by Erica Oakley

Cake and pastry consumption in the People’s Republic of China is growing but millers there struggle to produce the best flour for their customers. By leveraging expertise on its staff and working with public and private partners, USDA Foreign Agricultural Service cooperator U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) were increasing exports of soft white wheat to China for farmers in Washington state, Oregon and Idaho prior to the implementation of retaliatory tariffs.

Soft white (SW) wheat mills into excellent cake and pastry flour needed to meet growing Chinese demand. Chinese mills have some influence on what type of wheat may be imported and may import a limited amount of wheat privately. This supports USW using funding from the Market Access Program (MAP) and the Foreign Market Development (FMD) program to promote SW performance and help millers purchase it and mill it.

In June 2017, USW brought six executives from four Chinese flour mills to Portland, OR, to participate in a wheat procurement course and visits to the USDA-ARS Western Wheat Quality Laboratory in Pullman, WA, and SW breeding programs in the Pacific Northwest.

In China, USW arranged technical support meetings at local flour mills. Its Beijing and Hong Kong staff set up local trials with millers to demonstrate SW flour performance in Chinese and Western style baking. USW continued sending consultants to the Sino American Baking School in Guangzhou to teach new bakers the best uses of SW flour in cakes and pastries.

Also in 2017, USW and flour mill manufacturer Buhler teamed up to put on a week-long technical seminar focused on the milling of SW at Buhler’s location in Wuxi, Jiangsu province. Peter Lloyd and Buhler experts addressed 16 managers from eight Chinese mills who all reported that the seminar addressed some of the unfamiliar challenges of milling SW.

After importing less than 52,000 metric tons (MT) of SW in marketing year 2015/16 (June 1 to May 31), China purchased more than 227,500 MT in 2016/17. In 2017/18, China’s imports of SW stood at 307,000 MT. USW staff notes that much of this volume was imported by trading companies that had to pay out of quota duties on the wheat, in the hope of selling it on to Chinese mills willing to pay a premium over domestic wheat.

That year, prior to the trade conflict with China, total U.S. wheat exports reached 1.6 MMT with returns of more than $330 million 2017/18 to wheat farmers and related industries in Washington, Oregon and Idaho.

May 1, 2018/by Erica Oakley

The popularity of non-traditional baked goods like chewy breads, cookies and fluffy cakes is rapidly growing in the People’s Republic of China. To help build a preference for flour from U.S. wheat classes among aspiring Chinese baking companies, USDA Foreign Agricultural Service cooperator U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) has expanded its technical capabilities through staffing and an exceptional training activity.

USW hired Dr. Ting Liu in September 2016 as Technical Specialist to provide support and training to demonstrate the performance of U.S. wheat in the new baked goods as well as traditional Chinese wheat based products. Dr. Liu works from USW’s Beijing office and regularly travels across China to provide baking demonstrations, technical seminars and promote practical application of U.S. wheat performance results. Staff administrative expenses for Dr. Liu and her experienced marketing colleagues in China are supported by the Foreign Market Development (FMD) program with development activities funded by the Market Access Program (MAP).

Because there is intense interest in professional baking expertise, especially in scaling up industrial sized operations, USW decided to invest some of its activities funding to send Dr. Liu to the 192nd Baking Science and Technology course at AIB International in Manhattan, Kan., from January through May 2018. This is an internationally respected, 16-week program combining science, hands-on lab work and baking tradition in its course work. With her expertise in food science and cereal chemistry, Dr. Liu was well prepared for this training — but she far exceeded expectations.

Dr. Liu represented herself, USW and the U.S. wheat farmers she represents with distinction, earning honors as the course’s top student and an “Excellence in Laboratory Leadership” award for her participation in the course. Now she will apply this advanced knowledge to effectively stress that flour which performs its intended functions enables Chinese bakers to produce higher quality, better tasting wheat foods, and that U.S. wheat flours are essential ingredients on which bakers can rely for consistent results.

Though China’s centrally planned food and trade policies create substantial barriers to export growth, the increased ability to train the industrial bakeries that must meet consumer demand is pulling in high protein U.S. hard red spring (HRS) and hard red winter (HRW) wheat for bread products and soft white (SW) for cakes and cookies. In marketing years 2016/17 and 2017/18, China imported an average of 843,000 metric tons (MT) of HRS, 163,000 MT of HRW and 318,000 MT of SW per year, valued at about $324 million per year for farmers and wheat supply participants in the Pacific Northwest and Northern Plains.

May 1, 2018/by Erica Oakley

baking, Colombia, Colorado, flour, Foreign Agricultural Service, hard red winter, HRW, Kansas, Market Access Program, Nebraska, Oklahoma, technical service, Texas, U.S. wheat, U.S. Wheat Associates, Wheat Hard Red Winter

Baking Workshops Build Demand for U.S. Hard Red Winter Wheat in Colombia

In Colombia, USDA Foreign Agricultural Service cooperator U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) is helping increase demand for flour made from U.S. hard red winter (HRW) wheat by investing in technical support for commercial bakeries using funding from the Market Access Program (MAP).

Demand for better quality baked goods is growing in Colombia, with increasing disposable consumer income in urban areas like the capital Bogota. To offset traditional preferences for Canadian spring wheat as the main source of flour in Colombia, USW is following a strategy to conduct artisan style bread baking seminars. The processes they are teaching produce better quality bread that appeals to consumers and require flour with more HRW, which helps bakeries reduce input costs compared to flour from higher priced Canadian spring wheat flour.

For example, USW contracted with baking consultant Didier Rosada to conduct a full week of baking and technical consulting in August 2017 at a large commercial bakery chain in Bogota that produces over 117 bread varieties, two pastry product lines and more than 60 à la carte dishes in its restaurants. The company found the demonstrations so appealing, it immediately asked suppliers to provide the HRW flour blend that Rosada used in his seminars. As a direct result of this MAP-funded export market development activity, one of the company’s flour supplier imported a relatively small volume of HRW in November 2017. Immediate sales of that flour convinced the mill to change its artisan bread flour blend from a base of 80 percent Canadian Western Red Spring wheat to 100% HRW in 2017 and it became the regular supplier to the bakery chain.

In marketing years 2014/15 and 2015/16 (June to May), Colombia imported 430,000 metric tons (MT) of HRW. The technical support strategy there has helped increase HRW commercial sales to 977,000 MT in 2016/17 and 2017/18, supporting U.S. wheat farmers from Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado and Nebraska. These exports represent total revenue of about $217 million.

May 1, 2018/by Erica Oakley

Pasta Represents New, Growing Opportunity for High-Protein U.S. Wheat in Egypt

Building Chinese Demand for U.S. Soft White Wheat

USW Training Achievement Supports Long-Term U.S. Wheat Promotion in China

Baking Workshops Build Demand for U.S. Hard Red Winter Wheat in Colombia

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