FEED Business Worldwide March, 2012

 

 

by F.E. OLIMPO

 

 

Wide-ranging issues surrounding feed crop security, feed additives, safety, sustainability, nutritive value and technical aspects were discussed during the FIAAP Asia Conference 2012. Held on February 16th at Thailand's  Bangkok International Trade and Exhibition Centre (BITEC), the conference attracted senior feed grain, feed additive and trade executives from Southeast Asia, Europe and the United States.

 

Eric J. Brooks, editor of Feed Business Worldwide magazine and senior analyst at  Singapore-based eFeedlink Pte, touched on the increasingly delicate balance between Asian meat demand, South American feed crop supplies and long-term weather cycles.

 

According to Brooks, Asia's burgeoning meat demand had already led to two rounds of meat price inflation, the first one mostly powered by scarce soy supplies, the second by corn harvest shortfalls. , he warned, could lead to "food price agflation" given the North and South America's declining corn and soy supply. 

 

Likening the Americas' control over world feed crop supplies to the Persian Gulf's dominance of the oil market, Brooks explained why  South America will find it far more difficult to satisfy Asia's demand for corn than it did in coming to the soy market's rescue. With South America entering a 30-year cycle of dry weather, Brooks concluded that the next two decades would be keynoted by unstable feed corn supplies and much price volatility

 

To head off such feed crop volatility, Matthew Caspari, managing director of Aurora Algae, Australia, advanced that algae can be simultaneously used to satisfy both livestock feed demand and as a biofuel input. According to Caspari, algae is not only a great source of protein, it also "provides other essential high value nutrients that are vital to the healthy growth of animals and humans alike in a sustainable and infinitely scalable manner."  Moreover, with algae, there is no feed-versus-fuel argument, as it "can be grown on an ever-increasing scale to simultaneously meet demand from feed, fuel and food markets."

 

However, the bulk of FIAAP's discussions centered on feed safety and optimizing feed efficiency. With regards to the latter, Mr. Johan den Hartog, managing director of GMP+ International, The Netherlands, used the occasion to brief the conference on the goals and mission of GMP+ in ensuring food and feed safety around the world. He especially explained the GMP standard's new extensions, and their relevance to Asian livestock's recent food and feed safety issues, which are inter-related.

 

He was followed by Sarah Cervantes-Pahm, director of feed marketing for Southeast Asia at Schillinger Genetics, U.S.A. She took the occasion to unveil the company's new soy variety. Called Navita, it has been bred to contain up to 80% less of anti-nutritional compounds such as trypsin inhibitors and oligosaccharides than conventional soy.

 

According to Cervantes-Pahm, soy and soymeal are the best protein sources for animal feeds. But these products, she says, contain anti-nutritional factors "that limit their potential inclusion levels in diets for monogastric animals." These factors are usually removed through various soy processing techniques, such as heat or solvent extraction. However, these methods destroy soy's nutrients and reduce its digestibility. Navita soy makes such methods redundant and by doing so, increases the amount of soy available as livestock feed.

 

She was followed by Sheila Heidi M. Ramos, technical sales manager of Evonik Degussa, Singapore, who underscores the importance of accurately determining the amino acid content of soy and soymeal used in feeds. This could be done, she reveals, through the use of the company's technology called Aminored.

 

Many speakers looked at other technical aspects to increasing feed safety and availability. Xabier Arbe Ugalde, poultry and feed quality manager for Europe of Novus International, stressed the importance of maintaining cleanliness in feed mills.

 

Fernando Tamames III, vice president of Citrex, U.S.A., spoke about the use of clay as mycotoxin binders, pointing out that not all clays were created equal. "Many types of clays do not capture mycotoxins; some can absorb water, others can absorb ammonia, and only certain clays can absorb mycotoxins."  Therefore, according to Tamames, "the effectiveness of a mycotoxin absorbent has to be evaluated by conducting in vivo test using a scientific experimental design which measures the beneficial effects of the product on animal performance and on the target organs affected by the mycotoxin being studied."

 

Other speakers pointed out the effectiveness of new, non-antibiotic feed additives.  Mr. Juan M. Hernandez Vieyra of Yara Phospates, Argentina, discussed the use of organic acids in the control of salmonella in soymeal.

 

Dr. Pim Langhout, technical director at Nutriad International, Belgium, used the forum to argue for the use of butyric acid for optimizing gut integrity in broilers. Studies have shown, he says, that when present in the blood stream, butyric acid "stimulates mRNA that increases cell proliferation for villi development." And "when it is present in the lower part of the intestinal tract it can attach to specific G-protein receptor cells. These receptor cells will improve feed utilisation via a better feed passage rate as well as regulate and optimize the response to inflammatory stimuli."

 

Ms. Merryl Webster, managing director of UK-based Format International explained new strategies for evaluating non-linear constraints in enzyme usage and effectiveness. In all, it was a deep, meaningful conference that covered all major feed making issues, from their feed crop supplies to milling techniques, solvents to alternative ingredients. Full of fascinating insights, FIAAP Asia gave participants much new information and raised questions that can only be answered in conferences to come.