Much of the agricultural economy of the United States is dedicated to growing protein, with the USDA estimating total national animal/animal product cash receipts to reach $275.4 billion in 2025.
Corn and soybeans, the two most widely planted crops in terms of national acreage, are commonly processed to feed cattle, hogs and poultry. The large preponderance of domestic soybeans is crushed for soybean oil and soybean meal; with the former used for biomass-based diesel fuels in addition to food and industrial use, and the latter overwhelmingly used for hog and poultry feed. Corn, meanwhile, is a primary input to cattle feed in addition to being distilled for ethanol. Other grain and oilseed inputs to animal feed include oats, cottonseed meal, wheat middlings, grain sorghum and soybean hulls.
Vitamins and Amino Acids: Critical Components of Animal Feed
Beyond field crop inputs, vitamins and amino acid supplementation has been found to be essential to optimal livestock and poultry health and growth. Major inputs to animal feed include the amino acids Dl-Methionine – produced domestically by Evonik in Alabama and Novus in Texas – L-Lysine and other varieties (Threonine, Tryptophan, Valine, etc.), in addition to Vitamin A, Vitamin E, B Vitamins, Vitamin C and Vitamin K. While vitamins are nutrients essential to organ function and metabolic processes, amino acids can be considered the building blocks of proteins, necessary for muscle growth in humans and animals.
Global feed additives pricing and market intelligence provider Kemiex estimates that feed demand in the U.S. will reach about 206 to 275 million metric tons (MMT) in 2025, having seen 1% annual growth over the past four years. For the next 10 years, feed consumption is forecasted to grow about 1.15% annually, or about +25 MMT, driven by poultry, dairy and swine.
This translates into an estimated 30,000 to 35,000 metric tons of feed-grade Vitamin E 50% consumption in the U.S. in 2025, a value of approximately $250 million to $400 million considering the ongoing risks around chemical factory disruptions, potential new tariffs or anti-dumping proceedings. Vitamin E 50% is just one additive often included in feed premixes – these blends also consist of other vitamins, amino acids, minerals, and supplements, which are likewise affected by high feed additives price volatility and supply concentration.
Cattle feed, for example, may be composed largely of corn by weight, but with necessary supplementation, is still subject to significant exposure to fluctuations in vitamin and amino acid prices. Vitamin and amino additions to cattle feed include Vitamin A, Vitamin E, Biotin, B Vitamins and Vitamin K.
A price change in just one component can have a significant impact on the overall cost of a cattle feed premix. In one of Kemiex’ cattle sample premix, synthetic Vitamin E 50% makes up about half of the premix mass and 40% of its cost, based on a China FOB mid-market price of $14.20/kg. This effect was clearly seen after a July 2024 explosion at a German chemical plant disrupted global Vitamins A and E supplies, driving the index price to nearly $27.00/kg by mid-September. As of May 2025, it has since declined to just over $18.50/kg FOB China.
Challenges Facing the Vitamin and Amino Acid Industry
Although the United States is a net exporter of grain and oilseed feed inputs as well as swine and poultry meat, the U.S. is highly dependent on other countries for critical feed ingredients, many of which are nearly exclusively produced in China, with some European or Asian plants operated by groups such as BASF, dsm-firmenich or CheilJedang.
This trade imbalance with China has emerged at the political fore in recent months, stressed in the February 2025 Senate Testimony of Lori Stevermer President, National Pork Producers Council and the subject of the proposed legislation S.5277 - Securing American Agriculture Act, which would require the USDA to complete an assessment of global feed production and submit recommendations for greater self-reliance for feed ingredients.
Vulnerability to foreign supply dynamics was demonstrated in the aforementioned explosion in a Ludwigshafen vitamin factory that sent Vitamin A and E prices soaring. After the explosion, Germany’s share of Vitamin E imports to the United States sank, ceding a larger share to Switzerland for the full year 2024. In 2024, 68% of Vitamin E imports came from China, totaling approximately 29,000 metric tons (MT), and about 7,400 MT, or 17%, came from Switzerland.
With very little vitamin and amino acid production occurring in the United States, trade is thus a crucial issue to the nation’s livestock producers. As markets anticipated potential tariffs, monthly vitamin imports to the United States surged to nearly $170 million in December 2024 and $200 million in January 2025. After tariffs were announced in early April 2025, some of the vitamins and amino acids were exempt from reciprocal tariffs per Annex II and III from the President’s executive order, however, remain subject to 20% IEEPA and fentanyl related tariffs. Imports of micro ingredients from China face significant uncertainty due to unclear HS code classifications, with duty rates varying widely – from 20% to over 170% depending on how products are categorized.
As risks persist in the micro ingredients space, reliable market intelligence will continue to play an important role for a variety of market participants across the globe.
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