May 15, 2014
 

Evonik's amino acid-based feed calculator advances sustainable meat production

Evonik has introduced their new AMINOFootprint^® calculator which enables feed manufacturers to determine and further optimise the environmental impact of their products.

This in turn lets them make a tangible contribution towards sustainability in meat production. "When consumers inquire about the ecological footprint of a pork cutlet, feed manufacturers are affected as part of the supply chain," said Dr. Reiner Beste, President of the Health & Nutrition Business Unit of Evonik.

The recently completed SFIS project (Specialty Feed Ingredients Contributing to Sustainability) demonstrated the large influence of animal feed composition on this footprint. Based on worldwide data from the industry, the project involved the creation of a comparative eco-balance of compounds for poultry and swine, both with and without added amino acids and enzymes (phytase). As the results showed, supplementing the feed mixes significantly reduces the environmental burden with regard to climate change, eutrophication, and acidification.

This positive effect is primarily based on reducing the raw protein content by adding amino acids, which decreases resource consumption and lowers the associated emissions in carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and sulphur dioxides. Evonik proved this for the first time with an eco-balance in 2000. An eco-balance for all four feed amino acids produced by Evonik, namely MetAMINO^® (DL-methionine), Biolys^® (source of L-lysine), ThreAMINO^® (L-threonine) and TrypAMINO^® (L-tryptophan), has been available since 2010.

The SFIS project followed the same eco-balance methodology that is used for the sustainability assessment of the Evonik amino acids.

Dr. Michael Binder, Sustainability Manager of the Health & Nutrition Business Unit of Evonik, has made a substantial contribution to the project when chairing the Technical Board. Once the ongoing review process has been completed in accordance with the international standard DIN EN ISO 14044:2006, the results will also be made available to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations for possible inclusion in the new FAO guidelines for the sustainable evaluation of animal feed.

"The SFIS project represents the current industry average for the analysed feed additives, but our amino acids have significantly better values based on the efficiency of our manufacturing processes," explained Binder. Evonik plans to publish an update of its own eco-balance this year as its production processes have been continuously optimised over the past years.

The toolset used in the project was recently supplemented with AMINOFootprint^®, a web-based application that calculates the ecological impacts of various feed components along with their transport and processing. It also helps with the determination of feed mixes for pig or poultry feed. The tool enables feed manufacturers to compare the use of local protein sources with imported soy to optimise the ecological impact of their logistics chain or to reach decisions about the location of new sites.