Chile opens market to US duck meat

The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Chilean Ministry of Agriculture have finished negotiating the certificate language to export frozen and chilled poultry meat to include duck meat, according to the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service.
The USDA has already updated the Export Library to reflect the opening of this new market, and U.S. duck exporters have containers ready to go. U.S. exporters have been successfully exporting almost $40 million worth of chicken and turkey meant and products annually to Chile since 2008 and the addition of duck meat rounds out the selection, according to the Foreign Agricultural Service.

Chileans consider duck to be a gourmet product, and there is a small Chinese population that commonly eats duck meat. The Ministry of Agriculture has some small farmer programs to promote duck breeding for this niche market. According to the results of their experience and the market development since 2005, the demand can reach 60 tons a year, about $380,000, and almost all of the production is consumed at restaurants in Santiago, Chile. The recommendation is that U.S. duck exporters link with Chilean firms that target the retail market that is available to the average Chilean in order to best access the small market with growth potential.