What associations does Holland trigger for you? They are quite few, but they are bright: tulips, coffee shops, Vincent van Gogh, etc. But the list of associations for agribusiness representatives is far more - the small North European country is one of the leaders in the European and global agribusiness. We once again visited the Netherlands during our preparation work for the conference, and became deeply impressed - it is amazing how much the Dutch have managed to realize in their country, recovering nearly one-half of the total area from being flooded by the sea, and transformed it into the unique logistics hub.
As a reminder, Rotterdam will become the venue for one of the following conferences of APK-Inform Agency, which will be held on June 2-3, 2016. The conference focuses on the market of vegetable oils and oilseed meals. But why exactly Rotterdam? Because, to date the Netherlands work as the important player on the global market of veg oils and oilseed meals, reaching the first position in the EU by oil refining and storage volumes, the fourth position – by margarine production and oilseed processing, and the third position - by production of biodiesel. Not too bad for a country with the territory equal to the common territory of Volyn and Lviv oblasts, dissected by straits and rivers, built with dams, etc. And it is not just the geographical location, but first of all it is the Dutch mentality - clear and effective. Combination of such factors formed the required logistics schemes and solutions which allowed to construct one of the largest global logistics hubs as of to date (but 10 years ago, it was really the largest one) for many products, in particular agricultural commodities, at the territory of a small agricultural country. At the same time, the Netherlands is also the global leader on the flower market, significant player in the market segments of fruits and vegetables, dairy products and meat (not only as the country-exporter of just products, but also the supplier of modern technologies for its production, storage and processing). Logistics became the main competitive strengths and source of revenue for the Netherlands.
The first part of our visit included the meeting in the Netherlands Oils and Fats Industry (MVO), and NOFOTA, where we received a detailed presentation of the fat-and-oil sector of the Netherlands and the Nordic countries. In addition, it was good to know that representatives of both organizations were well informed about the current situation on the fat-and-oil market of Ukraine, its key players, export directions, etc.
Here is some impressive information of MVO about "Dutch fat-and-oil miracle": last year the Netherlands imported 3.6 mln tonnes of soybeans, 2.8 mln tonnes of palm oil, 1.6 mln tonnes of rapeseed, 632 thsd tonnes of sunflower seed, nearly 350 thsd tonnes of sunflower and rapeseed oils each, etc. By the way, the domestic production of oilseed crops in the country totals 10 thsd tonnes only, and the import volumes of oilseeds and its by-products - more than 12 mln tonnes per year! During 10 recent years, the growth of vegetable oils refining capacities totaled 50%. For many years the Netherlands came to the TOP-5 of the global leaders by palm oil imports, and is one of the key importer of soya products from South American countries.
Although, the Black Sea countries are not so large suppliers of agricultural products to the Netherlands, as opposed to Brazil or Malaysia, we also have a lot to be proud of, because the shipment volumes of vegetable oils and meals of Black Sea origin continue growing. Since the beginning of the current season, the Netherlands imported 167.47 thsd tonnes of sunflower oil from Ukraine, against 45.62 thsd tonnes in the same period of 2014/15 MY. In the reporting period, the supplies of sunflower meal reached 119.37 thsd tonnes (84.45 thsd tonnes).
A visit to the port of Rotterdam and meeting with its management was our key meeting. Future cooperation within frames of the conference, namely - the unique tour to the port complex of Rotterdam, was the major topic of our discussion there. During the tour, the conference participants will receive an opportunity to go through all main parts of the port by a special tour boat, get acquainted with terminals and enterprises, ask questions regarding the terminals` capacities, and learn about possibilities to work with companies of the Rotterdam logistics cluster. And there is really enough work for everyone! To date, the cluster includes 120(!) enterprises. It is not only the storage and shipment capacities, but also the processing, refining ones, production of biodiesel, bulk and dry bulk cargoes, and the whole range of agricultural products - soybeans, rapeseed, vegetable oils, oilseed meals, corn, molasses, etc. 6 plants for biodiesel production are located on the territory of the port of Rotterdam, as well as 5 plants for oils refining, 17 terminals for storage of fat-and-oil products (storage capacities - 1.2 mln tonnes), and other companies. The cluster map is full of familiar names, including Сargill, IOI, Wilmar, Abengoa, Vopak, Unimills, etc. The port of Rotterdam is the largest industrial port of Europe, with cargo shipment volumes in 2015 at the level of 466.4 mln tonnes (up 4.9% compared with 2014). The coast length of the port is more than 40 km, and its general areas - 12.5 thsd ha. The port of Rotterdam continues increasing its shipment volumes of agricultural products year by year.
The Chief marketing officer at the port of Rotterdam told us about all new opportunities to work in the port for traders and logistics companies, potential investors and partners. In addition, the port team has long been planning to develop beyond Rotterdam - they are actively developing the international cooperation trend, acting as investors, developers and partners to various port projects worldwide. According to the recent official news: the port of Rotterdam will become the developer of a new large-scale port in Brazil, and not official news –a number of countries from around the world are in the list for further realization of similar projects. As one might imagine what result the trade potential of Brazil and the perfect logistics solutions of hardworking Dutch will yield!
As the north gates for agricultural products, the present-day Rotterdam is the important business center, with the maximum concentration of offices of the key global and European agricultural companies-monsters: Nidera, Glencore, Cargill, Unilever, ADM, IOI and Wilmar European offices, etc. Abundance of skyscrapers and domination of laconic architecture in modernist style only strengthen the certain business image of the interesting city.
See you in June, Rotterdam is calling!
Svetlana Synkovskaya, APK-Inform Agency
