High Oleic soybean oil is now being incorporated into dairy cattle feed rations and is positively affecting animal health. Don Wyss, chair of the United Soybean Board’s Audit and Evaluation Committee, says it’s been a “journey” to get the high oleic soybean oil into cattle rations.
“We at USB brought the high oleic program forward, and it was all originally intended for food use, for the healthier soybean oil being produced from these high oleic soybeans. But here in the last short while, we have found some benefits, some significant benefits for areas of the feed industry, in particular dairy. So, June being Dairy Month, it is great to highlight this new-found benefit from high oleic soybeans going into dairy rations and improving that overall butterfat yield. I, as a farmer, really like this from the standpoint that we are paving the way for a more stable demand foundation going forward when we can rely on both food juices, which haven’t gone away. They’re still there, but now we’re bringing this exciting new feed usage of high oleics into the mix as well. Real excited going forward.”
He said checkoff dollars helped with the research on high oleic soybeans in dairy cattle feed rations.
“It’s a significant example of why we, as U.S. soybean farmers, pay into our checkoff to promote our industry overall and to bring big changes and developments to us that come back to our family farms around the country. The high oleic program has been a perfect example, I guess, is how I would describe it as a place where we’ve spent significant checkoff dollars but are now seeing significant returns that are coming back to our farms. One of the pieces that was taking time to grow is just being able to offer this to all U.S. soybean farmers, and we’re not there yet, but now we’re in 16 states, and with this continued development with dairy, you know it’s going to expand into other states as well when they are trying to partner with other dairy locations around the country.”
Getting the soybeans into dairy cattle rations benefits soybean farmers and cattle producers.
“I call it a win-win. You know, we’re winning by seeing this go into the feed rations of dairy cows but also continuing to, in a tighter margin environment, see new developments on the demand side for our soybeans, and this is only going to continue to grow going forward with the results that we’re seeing coming out of that benefit to the dairy industry. There’s some additional work being done in swine right now, too, to look at this, so we may not be done yet.”