Poultry value chain partners join forces

A consortium of Dutch poultry value chain partners is joining forces in a public-private partnership on insects as protein source in poultry feed. Protix, ForFarmers, PHW Group's Dutch entity Esbro, Venik and Wageningen Livestock Research will work closely together over the next two years. Their joint effort is to investigate how ingredients from black soldier fly insects in poultry feed affect the sustainability, health and welfare parameters of slow growing broiler chickens.

Insects are naturally a beneficial food source for poultry. Feeding insects to poultry is now an interesting opportunity to convert low-value organic by-products into high-value feed ingredients, as the European Commission will approve the use of insect meal in poultry and pig feed in September 2021. This opportunity could expand the range of feed ingredients for chicken producers, but more information is still needed for the whole poultry chain. The consortium is diligently pursuing a science-based approach to evaluate potential value-adding elements of chicken feed containing insect components of the black soldier fly (BSF).

Three phases

The research project will be conducted in three phases, starting with a pilot to study the effects of different inclusion levels of BSF larvae-derived ingredients in poultry feed. Based on the results of this pilot, different broiler feeds will be tested on a large scale in chicken farms. In the third phase, BSF products in broiler feed will be tested in combination with other alternative regionally grown protein sources to study these effects.

Esbro.nl

From left to right Michel van Spankeren - Protix, Joost Sparla - ForFarmers, Arya Rezaei Far - Wageningen Livestock Research, Josef Benedikt Bachmeier - PHW Group, Willem Tel - Esbro, Istvan Fodor - Wageningen Livestock Research, Ziming Wang - Wageningen Livestock Research (internship), Piet van Wikselaar - Wageningen Livestock Research, Jan van Harn - Wageningen Livestock Research, Teun Veldkamp - Wageningen Livestock Research (project leader), Leon Luyben - Protix, © Guy Ackermans