by Ben Nuelle
Iowa Agriculture Secretary Bill Northey will return from a four-day trip to the Caribbean Friday. Northey is visiting with farmers in Costa Rica Thursday and visited the Dominican Republic Tuesday and Wednesday.
He says with Dominican Republic being a big importer of corn and soybean meal to feed livestock, they are figuring out how to export more products to that country.
?Actually the Dominican Republic is one of the top ten importers of Soybean meal and has a potential to grow over time and the potential to add to the meat demand as well. Iowa exports pork to about 100 countries around the world. We certainly get to all of them every year but it is important to get to those customers and encourage them to buy more pork but thank them for the purchases they have made of Iowa pork.?
He says a lot of Dominicans come to the World Pork Expo. He says their market is very important to Iowa.
?The Dominican Republic is one of the bigger economies in the Caribbean. There is about 10 million people here. We have a group of Iowa farmers and Ag business folks down here visiting some of the folks that buy grain products to feed livestock as well as meat products that are used in meat processing as well so spending two days here then we go to Costa Rica for two days to try to increase the demand for Iowa products.?
Northey took the trip with Iowa Economic Development Authority and will return Friday.
