A US feed ingredient startup, Midwest Ag Enterprises, (MWA), has recently launched a new advanced soy protein feed ingredient, which it claims can replace up to 100% of fishmeal during some stages of marine fish and shrimp growout in aquaculture. 

The firm has partnered with Mexico\'s XPAND-AG, a feed ingredient distribution startup, to sell these products throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

Founder and general director Francisco de la Torre, is a Mexican-American with ten years of experience as a regional director for the US Soy Export Council, a position that he left last year to launch XPAND-AG.

Interviewed in Guayaquil in September, de la Torre told Undercurrent News that while working with soy exports, he devoted a lot of time to the development of products to replace fishmeal.

According to de la Torre, \"many people in the industry\", particularly feed producers, always thought that it was not possible to fully replace fishmeal. \"We have proven that theory wrong, developing this product,\" he said.

\"So from all these years promoting the use of soy proteins in aquaculture, we have developed some products that we are now offering on the market. Some of them are soy protein concentrates and a combination of soy and corn proteins that can replace most, if not all, of the fishmeal in the diets for aquaculture species,\" de la Torre said.

\"NutriVance is an advanced soy protein product with 65% of soy protein (on as fed basis), which is about the same amount that fishmeal has,\" he said of his firm\'s new product for the aquaculture industry. 

Source: Undercurrent News // Original Article