Dutch poultry farmers experiment with alternatives to soya

“The first thing to say is that soya is a highly economic raw material in a lot of livestock feeds. That’s why we use large volumes of it – it’s a very good source of amino acids that we need for feeding livestock,” said Nick Major
“The first thing to say is that soya is a highly economic raw material in a lot of livestock feeds. That’s why we use large volumes of it – it’s a very good source of amino acids that we need for feeding livestock,” said Nick Major

Some Dutch poultry farmers have been reducing the amount of soya in their chicken feed with the help of researchers at ForFarmers.

Specialists at the feed company’s Nutritional Innovation Centre at Lochem in the Netherlands have been looking at ways of reducing soya, which has to be imported from North and South America. And Forfarmers says it is now possible to produce a soya-free poultry feed without affecting the performance of the birds, although the company says the feed is more expensive than the standard diet with soya included.

“The first thing to say is that soya is a highly economic raw material in a lot of livestock feeds. That’s why we use large volumes of it – it’s a very good source of amino acids that we need for feeding livestock,” said Nick Major, corporate affairs director with ForFarmers.

“However, despite that, there are supply chains and some demand for diets that exclude soya or reduce it. So we have been looking at that on both the layer and broiler side. It is possible to do. You can exclude soya from diets and maintain the level of technical performance, but it does cost more and, therefore, our view is it’s likely to happen and be used in a supply chain environment where those additional costs can be passed up through the supply chain and, ultimately, onto the consumer if they are willing to pay for it.

Paul Grefte, a Dutchman who has 400,000 broilers on three farms said, “We have done tests with a few houses to look at where our borders are; see how far we could go."
Paul Grefte, a Dutchman who has 400,000 broilers on three farms said, “We have done tests with a few houses to look at where our borders are; see how far we could go."

“What you have to do is find alternative sources of the protein because what the soya is providing you with is the protein and amino acids.” He said that current alternatives included home grown proteins like rapeseed meal and sunflower meal.

“Those are classic alternatives that you will turn to,” he said. “On the longer run we are looking at things like insect protein. I think it’s quite a few years away yet but it is of considerable interest. It is highly sustainable and there is a lot of research going on,” said Nick, who said that regulations would have to be changed within the European Union before the feed industry would be able to use insect protein.

As we have reported previously in FarmingUK, a company in South Africa has already established a factory near Cape Town, producing insect larvae that are then dried and ground into a powder for use as a protein additive in feed. Nick Major said another alternative was the possible use once again of processed animal protein. He said he believed legislators would allow its use; the question was whether or not retailers and consumers would accept it. In the short term, he said, any alternative to soya would be things like sunflower and rapeseed meal.

Rutger Jansen, a specialist pig vet with ForFarmers, explained during the briefing how the Dutch had been seeking to reduce the use of antibiotics in feed
Rutger Jansen, a specialist pig vet with ForFarmers, explained during the briefing how the Dutch had been seeking to reduce the use of antibiotics in feed

At the moment, the demand for soya-free feed is relatively small. Andrew Knowles, pig and poultry marketing director with ForFarmers, said that probably less than five per cent of feed was soya alternative. “We have a solution, production without soya is very much a possibility, and we can make it available to customers and supply chains where they feel that is the right thing to do.” However, he and Nick said that moving over to a soya-free diet was in the very early stages for the poultry sector.

One poultry farmer who has been trialing reduced soya is Paul Grefte, a Dutchman who has 400,000 broilers on three farms close to the country’s border with Germany. He said that he had cut soya content in half – from 30 per cent of his chickens’ diet to 15 per cent of content.

“We have done tests with a few houses to look at where our borders are; see how far we could go. We even went without soya, which is also not a really big problem, but we went back with all our farms now with a level of 15 or 20 per cent soya,” said Paul, who said he found that soya provided some consistency in feed conversion amongst his birds.

“If you put soya in your feed, each flock is equal with feed conversion and the higher you go the more spread you have in your feed conversion. So some things are changing and soya is not in your feed for nothing. It has its reasons, but it’s certainly a possibility to grow your birds without soya.”

He said the main replacements for soya in the feed he used were sunflower and rapeseed. ForFarmers said that the additional cost of using poultry feed with alternatives to soya was “not insignificant.” Paul Grefte said that the difference in cost varied with the market. “Sometimes soya is more expensive than other times; sometimes rape is cheaper than other times, so you have to calculate all the time and that’s also what makes you decide to feed more or less soya at certain moments.”

ForFarmers outlined some of its work on the development of poultry and pig feed during a briefing at its Lochem base in the Netherlands. The company, which bought BOCM Pauls in the United Kingdom in 2012, says it is the number one total feed company in Europe, producing 8.9 million tonnes of feed in 2014 and generating annual revenue of 2.3 billion Euros. Some 38 per cent of its revenue is generated in the Netherlands, but 32 per cent of its income is from the UK. Another 22 per cent comes from Germany, with the rest generated elsewhere.

Rutger Jansen, a specialist pig vet with ForFarmers, explained during the briefing how the Dutch had been seeking to reduce the use of antibiotics in feed. The industry had set out to try to reduce antibiotic use following a threat from politicians that they would legislate unless the industry did so.

Rutger said the Dutch pig industry had reduced the use of antibiotics in feed by as much as 65 per cent in just a few years. The strategy was to initially move to giving antibiotics in water rather than in feed, and then to reduce use of antibiotics overall. He said that alternatives for maintaining animal health included formic, lactic and benzoic acid.