Feed ingredient trade lanes: what it actually costs, origin to mill
Short answer: An FOB price is not a purchase decision. Landed cost per tonne at your mill — freight, insurance, duty, VAT, port and clearance, inland transport, finance cost and weight loss — commonly runs 15–30% above FOB on high-value cargo, and well past 50% on low-value bulk into a congested or inland destination. That gap differs enough between lanes to reverse which offer is cheapest.
Each lane page carries a worked cost build-up you can overwrite with your own numbers, the Incoterm and freight-basis distinctions that decide who carries which risk, the documents the destination actually requires, the checks to run at discharge, and a request that hands the whole specification to suppliers on one basis.
Brazil → Egypt
Paranaguá / Santos / Rio Grande → Alexandria / Damietta / Ain Sokhna
On this lane, landed cost at an Egyptian mill is typically 15–30% above the Brazilian FOB price once freight, marine insurance, duty, port and clearance, inland trucking and LC cost are added. Compare offers on landed cost per tonne of protein at a stated moisture, not on the FOB headline.
Open the laneArgentina → Nigeria
Rosario / Up-River / Bahía Blanca → Lagos (Apapa / Tin Can) / Onne
On Argentina to Nigeria, the decisive cost lines are usually not freight but destination-side: port and clearance charges, inland trucking to inland mills, FX access and LC confirmation. Model landed cost per tonne at mill intake weight, and price the demurrage risk explicitly.
Open the laneChina → Saudi Arabia
Qingdao / Shanghai / Fangcheng → Jeddah / Dammam
DCP from China into Saudi Arabia moves in containers, so landed cost is driven by container freight, bagged handling and heavy-metal and grade documentation rather than bulk parcel economics. Price on landed cost per unit of available phosphorus, not per tonne of product.
Open the laneFigures on these pages are illustrative planning inputs compiled from FeedMatch quotation work. They are not live market rates, freight quotations, tariff rulings or offers. Confirm every cost line with your own supplier, freight forwarder, customs broker and bank before contracting.