May 22, 2014

Cobb invests US$15 million in doubling Dutch farm's capacity

 

 

 

Cobb's US$15 million investment in doubling the capacity of a Herveld pedigree farm was celebrated at recent events in Kasteel De Haar, near Utrecht, the Netherlands, during VIV Europe week.

 

The facility is a hub of Cobb research in Europe.   

 

Expansion of the Dutch farm, which came to Cobb after they purchased Hybro breeding company from Hendrix Genetics in 2008, is the latest move in increasing the company's global research and development programme. 

 

"The Herveld farm investment reflects our commitment to the importance of the European market sector to our business," said Jerry Moye, president of Cobb-Vantress, Inc.  "Europe remains a key focus for Cobb's long-term growth, and so this investment is part of our overall strategy for the future."

 

"These are exciting times for Cobb in our region," said Roy Mutimer, general manager of Cobb Europe.  "Expanding and renovating Herveld has transformed Herveld into a world-class research and development facility. 

 

"With investments in our European great grandparent facilities, we have an operation to ensure continuity and quality of supply to Europe, Middle East, Africa and markets beyond."

 

Herveld is set in Gelderland, the largest and least populated province of the Netherlands. The village is now developed as a state-of-the-art pedigree complex which will ensure continual breed improvement.

 

With the Hybro purchase, Cobb saw an opportunity to expand and remodel the farm along the lines of their five other research complexes in the US.

 

The investment, which brings around 70 additional jobs to Herveld, is in three phases.   The initial work was to renovate the on-farm hatchery in a US$1.25 million project to increase capacity and install the latest incubation technology. Thirteen new poultry houses have been built, with renovation of the original Herveld accommodation now well advanced. 

 

The Herveld project goes along with current investments in Europe and the Middle East where US$5.5 million has been spent in rebuilding a re-equipping great grandparent farms in the UK.

 

Another investment will contribute to the opening of a hatchery in Turkey which is expected to produce five million parent stock per year.

 

The new development at Herveld takes advantage of local landscape features to reduce its carbon footprint.  Lake water is used to help cool chicken houses in summer while ground-source heat is used in winter. It is believed to be the first combined system of its kind to be adopted in the Dutch poultry industry.

 

Strictest levels of biosecurity are routine. To guard against airborne pathogens, all air entering each house is filtered and positive pressure is maintained, a policy which is said to keep the location disease-free for over 25 years.

 

The European breeding programme, likes its US counterpart, places great emphasis on feed conversion efficiency while advanced technologies such as digital X radiography (using the lixiscope), blood oximeters and ultrasound ensure continuing development of robust, high yielding broilers.

 

"Genomics is becoming a more important part of the selection process," said Gosse Veninga, European research director.  "Genomics brings a higher accuracy of breeding values, especially for those traits which have not been measured at selection, such as reproduction traits or where we apply disease challenges off-farm on sibs or even on cross-breds.  That data will be used via DNA analysis for pure line selection. 

 

"Currently we are measuring more than 50 traits.  That does not mean every individual bird is selected on the basis of 50 traits - but if you look to the pedigree population as a whole, we are definitely measuring over 50 traits altogether.

 

"Based on our experience, and the experience of our customers, we believe that the Cobb500 is a well-balanced bird."

 

The Netherlands-based commercial trial farms which Cobb has opened over the past year are an integral part of its European breeding programme and offer testing environments to supplement genomics efforts and generate more robust broilers.