Export terminal aims to handle greater number of soybean cargos Mike Dorey, production manager, United Grain, Vancouver, Washington

A Pacific Northwest grain export terminal has encouraging news for South Dakota soybean farmers. United Grain’s Vancouver Export Terminal (VET) is currently the last stop for outbound U.S. corn, soybeans and wheat, but Production Manager Mike Dorey says, looking forward, the facility expects to handle a greater number of soybean cargos.

The bulk cargo vessel Sea Glory was being loaded with grain at the VET on the Columbia River for its trip across the Pacific to Pyeongtaek, South Korea. During a tour by South Dakota soybean farmers on South Dakota Soybeans’ See For Yourself tour on July 9^th, with that 750-foot ship in the background and against the sound of huge grain handling machinery, United Grain’s Dorey explained to the South Dakota Soybean Network what happens at the terminal.

“We handle wheat, soybeans and corn primarily. We will do some specialty crops here and there, but primarily corn, soybeans and wheat,” said Dorey, going on to explain the company’s rationale for deciding to handle more soybeans.

“Soybeans is an easier commodity for us to move through here. We know it's such a vital piece to other countries around the globe. And we can be a big reason for that because we can get trains in [and] unloaded quicker and loaded onto the ship faster, and we could process more beans through here.”

Ships, such as the Sea Glory, docked and being loaded at the Vancouver, Washington port at the time of the tour, sail to varying global destinations, according to Dorey.

“Primarily Asian markets,” he said, “everywhere from Vietnam, China, Japan, Korea; we do some to South America, and a few ships a year to the Middle East.”

South Dakota soybean farmers were watching the Portugal-flagged Sea Glory being loaded, but the ship was not taking on soybeans. Dorey told the growers, however, that the terminal will be shifting to a greater concentration of soybean cargos.

“Obviously with the political structure going on right now, there's been some trade issues with soybeans in the past,” Dorey explained. “We're hoping those kind of move past and that we could help orchestrate getting a lot of beans out of our country and into the countries that can really use them.”

Dorey said what he most wanted his South Dakota guests to take away from their visit, to the VET was that the terminal does its work with individual farmers in mind.

“That we care as much about their commodity and their product as they do,” he said. “That we want to have a bond with the producers in the countryside and to let them see how we treat their product when it gets here and how important it is to put all the U.S. grain into a good light.”