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Hamlet Protein CEO Erik Visser on trade volatility, China dependency and the supply chain reset
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Erik Visser, CEO of Hamlet Protein, joins the Feed Strategy Podcast to share his outlook on the forces reshaping the global animal feed industry in 2026. Drawing on a career spanning multiple continents and multinational companies, Visser makes the case that the industry is moving from a model optimized for efficiency to one that must be built for resilience. Here, he also identifies two things the industry tends to underestimate: the structural — not cyclical — nature of volatility, and the urgency of attracting new talent to the sector.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Feed Strategy Podcast
00:00:09
Speaker
Hi everyone, welcome to Feed Strategy Podcast. I'm your host, Jackie Rumke, Editor-in-Chief of Watts Feed Brands. This edition of Feed Strategy Podcast is brought to you by FeedStrategy.com. FeedStrategy.com is your source for the latest news and leading edge analysis of the global animal feed industry.
Expectations for the Feed Industry by 2026
00:00:30
Speaker
Recently, I connected with Eric Visser, CEO of Hamlet Protein. This conversation took place before the company announced that it was being acquired by Royal AgriFirm and also prior to the recent geopolitical crises that have been in the news. But I think the tone and his perspective regarding what the feed industry can expect in 2026 is still relevant.
00:00:52
Speaker
He outlined what feed producers should have on their radar throughout the remainder of the year, both the challenges and the opportunities.
Eric Visser's Journey in Animal Nutrition
00:01:02
Speaker
Here's that conversation.
00:01:05
Speaker
Thank you so much for joining the podcast, Eric. Well, let's get right into it. Tell us a little bit about yourself, your background and the other things that the audience would want to know about you.
00:01:17
Speaker
All right. Yeah, well, let's me jump right into it. I'm Dutch. I live in Amsterdam right now, but I consider myself to be, let's say, a professional gypsy. I've worked all across the world. I started my career in Latin America, moved to the Netherlands, then worked in Belgium, France, and currently I'm in Denmark.
00:01:35
Speaker
I was with leading multinational companies like Provimi, Cargill, Nuchat, and Adeseo. And currently I'm working based out of Denmark as a CEO of Hamlet Protein that focuses on specialty ingredients for young animal nutrition.
00:01:52
Speaker
And I feel privileged to work with teams and customers all over the world. I enjoy to travel and attend people at the place of work and very happy to be joining you in your podcast today. We're happy to have you.
The Passionate World of Animal Nutrition
00:02:03
Speaker
So what sparked your interest in the field?
00:02:06
Speaker
Yeah, I think some is by choice and and others, our careers bring us to places a little bit by accident. So when I started my career, when I left university, I wanted to see more of the world. It was not that I was bored of the Netherlands.
00:02:22
Speaker
I just wanted to explore different countries and different cultures. So I got a job interview at the one company that would send you across right away. So my first job was in actually in Guatemala and I left Holland with 10 books, a chair and a couple of shirts and that was it. And then that's how I started. And then i worked in chemical distribution for 12 years with Brandtac in Latin America in various countries.
00:02:49
Speaker
And then it was time to move back. and to Europe and then I ended up in Purvimi that was later acquired by Cargill in in ingredients and specialties business, but then focused on animal nutrition. And that's how I got into the animal nutrition and Quickly got quite fascinated by it.
Sales Cycles and Global Market Stability
00:03:11
Speaker
Fascinated because it's a global business, but also because it's a down to earth relationship in a B2B environment where people are really passionate about what they do, both on the sales side, but also on the customer side. And I've enjoyed it ever since. so this is a Huge market money-wise, but it's a small market people-wise.
00:03:35
Speaker
Our sales cycles are long. Relationship building is important. And I felt that whatever I learned throughout my career, I could employ in this industry. I'm still very happy to be a part of it.
00:03:48
Speaker
And you see a lot of the same faces moving from one company to the next, or at least that's what I've experienced. That's true. And and of course we benefit from that as well, because when you move from one company to another and you have to have the opportunity, then you bring people along that you've worked with successfully in the past. And that's what I've done as well in my different, in my different jobs.
Impact of Trade Policies on Supply Chains
00:04:10
Speaker
So given your experience on a global level, Let's start with the macro picture because I think it's really going to set the stage for the other things that we're going to talk about. From your perspective, how are shifting U.S. trade policies and bilateral relationships reshaping feed ingredient sourcing decisions for producers around the world?
00:04:32
Speaker
Yeah, it's a very good and interesting question that we actually debate and work on every day. so we're moving from a world that was optimized for efficiency to, let's say, a world optimized for resilience. So we see trade policies impacting not only fee cost, but they're also reshaping the way we look at at global supply chains.
00:05:00
Speaker
And we've seen incidents in ge geopolitical incidents across the past decade already doing so. But I think the current US trade policies are accelerating that. So they shift all the time, which makes it difficult to for an entrepreneur and a company to see what will be next.
00:05:20
Speaker
But also the evolving bilateral relationships, I'd say they are accelerating a transition that was already underway. So where efficiency was most important in the past, produce and you procure at lowest cost.
00:05:35
Speaker
We now are going risk adjusted regionalization and for feed ingredient sourcing. And that has several implications. We're moving away from looking at lowest landed cost.
00:05:47
Speaker
ah We now need to deal with not only tariffs, export control, sanctions, risk, regulatory, regulatory constraints. leading to amma to volatility in the market and policy volatility is a key driver. So right now you have to ask yourself, what is the particular political risk embedded in the supply chain I'm currently managing? How exposed am I to sudden tariff shifts or export restrictions?
China's Role in Vitamin and Amino Acid Production
00:06:16
Speaker
What happens if bilateral tensions escalate? so It is much more about risk management these days than just looking at at price and quality. That also means that feed ingredient sourcing is no longer just about procurement.
00:06:34
Speaker
It is right now a strategic function that involves geopolitics, financial risk management, and also long-term capital allocation. Where will you produce? Where will you source? so It is an increased complexity that's being driven by shifting trade policies that is probably accelerating a development that was already in motion.
00:07:00
Speaker
And where are you seeing the successes in navigating, especially at the volatility in the last five, six years with global conflict and then all these other wild cards that have entered the scene? Where have you seen companies really succeeding in their risk management?
00:07:19
Speaker
Ideally, you hedge your bets and that in our industry means that you're not focused on a very limited portfolio. You sell your products across species and across regions.
00:07:32
Speaker
ideally you have a diversified supply chain so that you not only produce in one region but can be flexible in where you want to export your products from so the let's say the diversification of po portfolio of species focus and of of where you produce will allow you to navigate that volatility much better and you can imagine right now if you for example if you are producing in the U S and your main export market is China and you have no other outlet to
Managing Supply Chain Risks
00:08:08
Speaker
service China, then the current situation is very challenging.
00:08:14
Speaker
You mentioned China for critical inputs like vitamins and amino acids. How does that exposure in the supply chain affect business and what options do producers actually have when the market is so limited?
00:08:28
Speaker
Yeah. That dependency is really, really, really strong. yeah And deteriorating trade relationships between the US or EU on one hand and China on the other hand can really critically impact animal nutrition and feed producers.
00:08:44
Speaker
China now that produces produces more than 70% of the world's vitamins, many of its critical amino acids. I think more than 75% the lysine, more than of the global demand of Access to Chinese supplies is critically important and that dependency is not going to change anytime soon. I think it's becoming more visible and perhaps are the U.S. market even more sensitive because most of the most of the feed specialties, feed additives, including vitamins and amino acids, are being produced outside the country.
00:09:21
Speaker
When the production is clustered, like in this case in China, then any disruption will lead to global price volatility. And that is what you have seen, especially in the vitamins. You see how prices bounce up and down.
00:09:36
Speaker
So there is no quick fix on this. You want to avoid single supplier the dependency, but it's probably easier said than done. You will want to maintain a strategic inventory of critical goods, but you have to look at the working capital demands of that. You can look at nutritional flexibility in your formulations, but we all know that you cannot formulate with amino without amino acids or vitamins.
00:10:03
Speaker
Long-term, obviously, the industry should look at the development of regional capacity, but that's a multi-year outlook. Because as soon we also see that there's a lot of pressure in our market to produce cheaply, to attend demand demand for well-priced meat, milk, and eggs.
00:10:25
Speaker
So we've also grown, let's say addicted to cheap inputs from Asian markets and China in particular.
Agility and Resilience in Agriculture
00:10:34
Speaker
And you have to consider that any change in that sourcing can lead to an increased cost. And in my view, we should go to a market where every player along the supply chain is able to get a fair income.
00:10:51
Speaker
And that may mean that the prices that you're going to pay in supermarkets are going to be higher than they are today. And playing off of what you just said, how do you build a business that can respond quickly when things go wrong or there are supply issues, availability issues and hedge against those market shifts.
00:11:16
Speaker
Yeah, you're right. You know, just agriculture is capital intensive and it's built around long production cycles and the turnaround or growth acceleration is not as easy in some other industries.
00:11:29
Speaker
So agility is a key word, it's a bit of a buzzword, but it's very real for us to make sure we are agile in our industry. And you don't build agility during a crisis.
00:11:42
Speaker
You have to build it into the system in advance. And so when there is a market volatility, the speed of decision becomes a competitive advantage. So you need to focus on real-time market intelligence.
00:11:56
Speaker
You will have to spend time on scenario modeling. And you also need to be very clear on who has the authority to decide what within your organization.
00:12:08
Speaker
Whenever accountability is unclear, organizations will slow down. And especially during disruption, people will need to know who decides, how can you decide quickly and based based on what data.
00:12:21
Speaker
So You need to foster a culture that expects a volatility. And our industry is has been getting accustomed to deal with certain volatility, but not to the level of volatility that we see in recent times.
00:12:39
Speaker
It's coming from so many different angles. It is ah the disease outbreaks. It is trade policies, climological climate changes, artificial intelligence, disruptions of the labor market.
00:12:52
Speaker
So we will have to consider that disruption is structural. So the ones, the companies that are able to deal with the volatility and have teams that are both trained and have power to adapt without waiting for the perfect moment or for the perfect information.
Balancing Feed Efficiency and Disease Resistance
00:13:13
Speaker
Those are the ones that are going to be able to deal with the with the increasing volatilities and the ones that stay in their old decision-making models and their old supply chain approach, they will struggle going forward.
00:13:27
Speaker
susan And of course, disease outbreaks are unpredictable, but also inevitable. How should producers or how could they factor that reality into their nutrition and sourcing strategies before it hits and not reacting after?
00:13:44
Speaker
Yeah, it's another interesting but topic. We will never know when an animal disease outbreak will occur, but we're absolutely certain that they will keep on occurring. So it's not if, but when.
00:13:59
Speaker
So the so strategic shift should be to move from reactive crisis management to more proactive resilience planning.
00:14:09
Speaker
And nutrition is the first line of defense. So when there's no threat of disease, it's tempting to optimize purely for feed efficiency and for margin, but resilient systems need to balance performance with immune resistance as well.
00:14:31
Speaker
And that means, you know, that you will have to focus on strengthening gut integrity. We all know that gut health is a key denominator for animal performance.
00:14:41
Speaker
We will have to reduce relies on single modes of actions. And we have to invest in precision nutrition and functional ingredients that support stress tolerance. Because when pressure diseases rises, animals with stronger baseline resilience, they will maintain their intake and they will perform better.
00:15:01
Speaker
but you cannot build immunity overnight and be ready once an outbreak begins. When we talk about sourcing strategies before in the context of disease risk, we're really talking about structural resilience and not just procurement efficiency.
00:15:16
Speaker
So that means the next to procurement, also the nutritionist and the vet play a very important role in the decision-making unit and the formulation and farm management.
00:15:28
Speaker
So in the end, you will be moving from lowest cost production to optimizing for the lowest risk production.
AI Integration in Animal Nutrition
00:15:40
Speaker
And of course, these are not always the same thing. It's not just in disease outbreaks, I think also another element, they don't just impact the animal production, they can also disrupt trade corridors. They can trigger export bans, slow port movement and create such sudden imbalances in the market.
00:16:01
Speaker
So there's a wider impact than just addressing animal diseases on farm. Shifting gears a bit to talk about technology. We just came off the Feed Mill of the Future conference with a heavy focus on AI in feed manufacturing. And the general sentiment was, of course, that the industry and has been a bit slower than other other sectors of agriculture to embrace ai What do you think is driving that gap, acknowledging the areas where the technology is, of course, best suited to assist? And where do you see that technology delivering real value first? You know, those real applications that can drive buy-in.
00:16:49
Speaker
Yeah, AI is a talk of town across industries and obviously and everywhere at home and at work, we all get exposed to it. In our sector, animal protein production, animal feed production, I think AI won't be revolutionary overnight.
00:17:07
Speaker
It's more a process of evolution. And the people that are able to embed it into the decision system step by step, systematically they will advance and not the companies that are now working at it as a, let's more as a marketing headline.
00:17:24
Speaker
Our industry is quite conservative and I'm sure and what we see is that the implementation of AI tools are being challenged by farm managers. I mean challenged by nutritionists.
00:17:37
Speaker
And this is not new when you look at the adaptation of novel feeding ingredients, That has also taken companies ah years before they would adapt and enter that into their formulation. So we are slow moving, but we are moving.
00:17:54
Speaker
yeah We deal with live animals. So animals do not have a standard performance and are influenced by a lot of factors that we cannot control, like genetics, health status, environmental conditions, and management practices.
00:18:10
Speaker
That's sometimes a bit complicated to weave that into an AI model. What I do expect is that we will see an increased focus on using data from multiple sources to create tailored diets, optimized diets for different animal species and a close monitoring of individual animal feeding behavior. So you get an early detection of health and nutrition challenges. And that is where the industry can really optimize a lot.
Consumer-Driven Sustainability
00:18:40
Speaker
And of course, we will see AI being applied in sustainability initiatives, optimization of water usage, energy usage, reduction of waste, et cetera, an important one to improve manure management.
00:18:57
Speaker
So there's a lot of opportunities And I'm sure we will see the effect of AI, but it's going to be one step and perhaps a small step, a small step at a time. It seems that formulation, training, again, within the feed mill and preventative maintenance seem to be the most obvious applications. But you mentioned sustainability. Is there anything else I'm missing in there that is kind of low hanging fruit for adoption?
00:19:26
Speaker
Yeah, I focused bit more on animal protein and animal nutrition, but you're right. you know When you look into a production environment, there's a lot of opportunity to be more efficient. And that's not necessarily sustainability driven, it's cost driven. and Obviously the better you manage data, the more, the more benefit you can get from AI tools. So I think optimization across the supply chain will help us to, to optimize, optimize cost. And and that will, in the end will be for the, for the benefit of all different planes in the industry.
00:20:01
Speaker
How are the most forward thinking of producers integrating sustainability into their risk management strategies? rather than treating it as a compliance exercise or part of the marketing conversation that it had been before. Yeah.
00:20:19
Speaker
You know, I travel all around the world for our business and there's a clear different approach towards sustainability in the different regions. It's very much under regulation in EU, whereas the US is much more defensive about the any regulation. We see generally that some of that regulation that the EU eu is creating will be slowly adapted by other regions as well. but The most important thing is that it is being driven by the consumer demand. So consumers are forcing the market to become more sustainable. That's for every market and our market is not an exception.
00:21:00
Speaker
So for me, sustainability is no longer a nice to have. It's going to be a must have throughout the supply chain. and I think an important thing is where you mentioned marketing as well. Obviously, sustainability has been a bit of a marketing approach for many companies in the past highlighting individual efforts. But you know right now, I see that sustainability not necessarily can be monetized.
00:21:26
Speaker
So customers will look at suppliers and will select them based on sustainable sustainable practices without necessarily paying a premium. So you will see that If two companies have a similar offer, then consumer will give a preference to to the ones that produce more sustainable and a more sustainable matter.
Challenges in Workforce and Volatility
00:21:49
Speaker
so When you look at animal protein producers, they will increasingly you focus on optimizing feed for better efficiency, and thus reduce their environmental impact.
00:22:00
Speaker
They will look at using alternative ingredients and in general improving animal health and welfare. And it's something that's very much driven by the market as well. I'd say at the same time, you also need to look at risk management as an integral part of sustainability practices because Future investments will increasingly take climate change into consideration as well. Where are you going to build your plant? Where are you going to build your farm? What is the expectation on the climatological circumstances that you will face in the next 15, 20 years when you have to realize a payback on your investment?
00:22:37
Speaker
And of course I mentioned it, regulatory demands. So there's got to be, that they got to force producers to integrate sustainability policies in their strategic planning.
00:22:48
Speaker
And timing wise, that may be different from region to region. And you can see, for example, in Europe, there's some concern that we will no longer have a level playing field if sustainability requirements are more stringent here in Europe than they are in other parts of the world.
00:23:05
Speaker
So that is something that we need to balance. But I think this is a development that's here to stay, get stronger rather than less important. And in your opinion, is there one thing that really stands out as an issue that the feed industry either globally or regionally tends to underestimate?
00:23:25
Speaker
What is that and what should they be doing about it? Yeah, I have one and maybe there's another one I would add as well, but you know, and say if have one thing, I think the feed producers underestimate speed and compounding nature of volatility.
00:23:44
Speaker
And we mentioned it before her here in this conversation, our industry has for decades operated in relatively stable cycles with relatively predictable ranges.
00:23:56
Speaker
But today, volatility is no longer cyclical. It's structural. There's geopolitical fragmentation. There's climate variability, trade realignment, disease pressure, regulatory differences between regions, shifting consumer preferences.
00:24:14
Speaker
And each of these elements alone may be manageable, but underestimating will come from how they interact and how quickly they compound.
00:24:25
Speaker
I think in a volatile environment, the advantage doesn't go to the largest player. It goes to the fastest and the most informed decision maker. And the feed producers who will win in the next decade, i don't think they will be the ones with the lowest cost structure in a stable year.
00:24:41
Speaker
They will be the ones that have best designed their systems for an unstable one.
Resilience and Adaptability in the Feed Industry
00:24:47
Speaker
So that volatility and how we respond to that is a critically important one.
00:24:53
Speaker
And I think another one that we underestimate as an industry is the importance of making sure that we attract talent to fill our positions going forward.
00:25:05
Speaker
You see that we, I think in general terms, you could say we have ah have an aging workforce. And we need to make sure that we as an industry continue to be attractive and that attractiveness doesn't come from the salaries that we pay. It will come from creating a purpose to contribute to feeding a growing global demand for safe feed to produce safe food.
00:25:31
Speaker
And that is something that we got a lot of good stories to tell in our industry. And sometimes we are under defensive. to defend what we do when we are part of a very innovative industry that is such an important element of feeding people around the world.
00:25:49
Speaker
And it's something that you can be proud to be a part of. I'm definitely proud to be a part of that. And I wish that we as an industry will do better to communicate that to the market and as such also become attractive for future talents that will make our business even more efficient and more sustainable and more successful going forward.
00:26:10
Speaker
Is there anything that we maybe haven't touched on that you think would help bring segments of this conversation together? Any key areas that maybe we neglected?
00:26:24
Speaker
As industry, we have made such tremendous progress in productivity and efficiency over the past decades.
00:26:35
Speaker
This is resilient industry in a sense. We will always have a demand for meat, milk, and eggs. But where is going to be produced and by whom? That is the big question mark. There is an underlying stable demand, but in the current market, it shifts where that demands are being serviced from. And I think I said it before, diversifies in your portfolio approach and being ready to respond to rapidly changing market conditions that that will set you up for success.
00:27:07
Speaker
Thank you so much for your time, Eric. And thanks to you for tuning in.