Page 31 - Export or Bust eBook

a whole lot of wheat.” He adds that almost all the gains benefit the U.S. with its 97 percent market share,
proving that “These kinds of investments are paying off.”

Key to this level of market dominance, Sowers insists, is being on-the-ground for decades with regional

offices and regular seminars. He says this presence builds trust with buyers and end-users to the point
that “Decision makers trust us, they look to us for advice.” He considers checkoff, FMD and MAP
funding vital to maintaining USW’s foreign offices and “absolutely essential to everything we do.”

Along with maintaining major current markets like South Korea and the Philippines, Sowers is also
focused on boosting sales in the world’s top wheat import market, Indonesia. That’s tough because it’s a
very low-price flour market. But he expects to win share by convincing both millers and bakers they can
increase their profits by shifting to higher quality wheat. “Even if we maintain a 10 to 15 percent market
share, it would be a stellar market for us,” he says.

“Our mandate is twofold,” Sowers says. “One is to create the greatest returns to our farmers, to the
people who fund us. The other mandate is to make the local industry here the most profitable they can
be, to increase their profits so they will buy from us.”

To make it all happen, Sowers hosts seminars year-round, with upcoming ones set for Manila, Bangkok
and Jakarta, “talking to buyers about methods that they can use to decrease their purchasing price or to

plan their purchases through the year. And then at the same time, have a mill management seminar
showing them how to increase their profitability using, of course, U.S. products.”

Along with working to increase exports to developing markets like Sri Lanka and Malaysia, Sowers says
Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam offer “the most opportunity for huge increases in sales” and that new

trade agreements offer the best way to make U.S. products more competitive.

Challenges breed new coalitions

USW’s Sowers and USGC’s Sanchez aren’t alone in
stressing the importance of signing new trade
agreements. Others include USW President Vince
Peterson and VP of Overseas Operations Mark
Fowler. Peterson says with the farm economy
struggling in an already down market, the tariff
battle with China puts 1.5 million metric tons of
U.S. wheat sales at risk just when unsettled NAFTA
and TPP issues threaten sales to other major buyers
like Mexico and Japan.

To help resolve such threats through trade agreements USW President Vince Peterson

and the existing World Trade Organization (WTO)
rules-based global trading system – and not with
escalating tariff threats – USW, USGC and other

groups are active in the 75-member Ag Exports Count

coalition and the 80-member U.S. Agricultural Export

Development Council.

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