November 27, 2020

Zhengchang 658: A third-generation premium chicken feed pelleting system

Press release

After 40 years of development, China's chicken industry has achieved global attention. The country's chicken industry is facing new opportunities and challenges from the domestic catering and consumer markets.

Since 2019, the African swine fever epidemic continues to ravage Asia, a continent of major pork production and consumption, and China has suffered particularly severe losses. China's live swine inventory has dropped to its lowest point in the past 10 years. Poultry meat has undoubtedly become the best substitute. Although China's chicken meat has not been shifting the diets of people as much as in the United States, Japan and the European Union, it remains the second largest source of meat protein for the Chinese.

With growing health awareness and quickening pace of life among the Chinese, low-fat chicken suitable for fast food cooking is gradually replacing high-fat, high-cholesterol pork. Experts predict that in 2020, the domestic pork production shortfall will further increase, meaning that the capacity for chicken to replace pork may increase by more than 3.1 million tonnes, translating to a required broiler capacity exceeding 2.1 billion head.

High-quality broilers are inseparable from good feeding practices. In order to better serve its customers and help them seize the current market opportunity, Zhengchang has introduced its third-generation premium chicken feed pelleting system, 658 (Dr. Chicken).

The pelleting system is a result of four years of persistent research, several field experiments, and joint trials with key customers in the final stage.

Improves feed and breeding quality, and producer's income

Zhengchang 658 can reduce the feed-to-meat ratio of broiler chickens (including chicken gizzards), ensure the production of safe and environmentally-friendly feed, and extend the productive life of grandparent hens. Taking a 50,000-tonne/year feed factory as an example, Zhengchang 658 can feed about 10 million chickens of average weight of three kilograms at RMB10 per kilogram (~US$1.52; RMB 1 = US$0.15). The feed-to-meat ratio is reduced by 0.05, translating to an increase of the total income of the producer by RMB9.47 million a year.

Increases operational cost-efficiency

With the same Φ3.5 ring die, a ring die pressing ratio of 1:14, the Zhengchang 200kw granulator can reach 14.5 tonnes/hour, which is three tonnes higher than other counterparts in the industry, and the power consumption per tonnes is 3.6 degrees lower than the counterparts. That is to say, for 20H production per day, continuous production for 300 days, at an electricity cost of 1 yuan/kWh, the producer can save 720,000 yuan per year.

Advanced process design