ASA’s World Initiative for Soy in Human Health hosted a delegation of government leaders from the Republic of Uzbekistan along with key Uzbek private-sector representatives today at the ASA/WISHH offices in St. Louis. The trade team led by Uzbekistan’s Ministry of Investment, Industry and Trade is seeking to buy U.S. soy and strengthen relationships with the U.S. industry. The meetings are well timed for WISHH’s expanded activities for poultry, livestock and aquaculture feed demand growth in the region as part of WISHH’s new Central Asia strategy. Currently, the United States has less than 1 percent of the market share for soy trade in the region.
WISHH hosted the group in advance of the “C5+1 Summit” in Washington, D.C. when U.S. President Donald Trump will meet with the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev and the leaders of all five Central Asian states for the first U.S.-Central Asia summit of his second term. The C5+1 Summit is a diplomatic platform and annual meeting between the United States and five Central Asian countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
In conjunction with these Presidential meetings, ASA CEO Stephen Censky will represent ASA and WISHH in a high-level U.S.-Uzbekistan Roundtable on November 6 in Washington, D.C. WISHH has coordinated closely with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service as well as U.S. soybean exporters and the U.S. Soybean Export Council.
WISHH’s expanding leadership role for U.S. soy in the Central Asian region was also a timely topic when WISHH Executive Director Gena Perry met with high-level officials from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan while all were attending the World Food Forum hosted by the Food and Agriculture of the United Nations in October in Rome.
