KIRBY, Ohio — Even with the flat terrain and almost endless corn and soybean fields in Wyandot County, it’s difficult to fathom this small county in the north-central part of the state is a pipeline to the Far East, to diners who crave non-genetically modified (GMO) soybeans.

DeLong Co., Inc. elevator officials discovered this lucrative market and are cashing in. Their elevator can store and process roughly 1 million bushels of these soybeans, which are highly coveted by Asian buyers, particularly Japanese.

According to Larry Holloway, general manager of the DeLong operations located in Kirby, the Asian markets – which include Japan, South Korea and Taiwan – have long been insistent that food-grade soybeans used to make their tofu, miso and soy sauce not be GMO.

"In the past, Ohio, Indiana and Michigan beans have been incredibly popular with the Japanese market. We have better protein content," Holloway said. "The beans in China and Japan are all non-GMO. They don’t allow GMO beans. They fear that GMO will cause adverse health problems, so getting them to use GMO beans isn’t going to happen."

This elevator is seeing quite a profit from this niche market. Roughly 98 percent of the soybeans grown in the United States are GMO. But that 2 percent of non-GMO beans is a market worth pursuing, Holloway said.

"It’s actually bigger than you think. It’s a pretty big market," he said. "Japan alone uses about a million metric tons of soybeans, and they grow about a third of what they need." For the other two-thirds, it imports 70 percent from the United States and 30 percent from Canada.

Besides wanting non-GMO soybeans, Asian buyers prefer the taste and protein content of soybeans that come from Indiana, Ohio and Michigan (known as IOM beans) – and they’re willing to pay a premium price to get them. Farmers in this area are getting $2-$3 per bushel more by growing non-GMO beans than they would cultivating conventional soybeans.

About 120 IOM farmers are contracted to grow non-GMO beans for Asian customers. DeLong is one of five grain elevators in Ohio that serve as non-GMO soybean collection points for this market.

In the Toledo area, The Andersons, Inc. of Maumee contracts with northwestern Ohio and southeastern Michigan farmers to grow non-GMO soybeans, which the company sells directly to Japan and other Asian buyers. The soybeans are collected in special bins, sent by rail to The Andersons’ dock on the Maumee River, loaded on a ship and sent abroad.

A trip to Asia takes about 30 days. This annual routine has gone on for more than two decades.

"We have been supplying food-grade quality soybeans to the Japanese market since the 1960s," explained Jeff Goetz, senior sales and merchandising manager for The Andersons. "In 1996, when genetically modified soybeans became prevalent, the company began sending those overseas.

"But in 1998, we were requested to separate out the non-GMO from the commodity stream. The Japanese asked us to keep them segregated, so we use identity preservation protocols to keep them separate from the GMO soybeans."

The USDA estimates America’s farmers grew a record 3.82 billion bushels of soybeans this year. But only about 760,000 bushels will be non-GMO.

"It’s a fairly large (niche) market and it’s becoming bigger here domestically," Holloway said. "The soymilk market is all non-GMO and we’re seeing a growth in that business. Chicken farms and dairies now are trying to differentiate themselves as non-GMO."