European poultry industry more antibiotics than ever-Leeson

Kitchener, Ontario - The European public forced a ban on antibiotics as a feed additive, but the poultry industry there is using more antibiotics than ever, adding it to drinking water, says nutritionist Dr. Steve Leeson of the University of Guelph.

If the same happens in North America, it would be a huge step backwards, because there is careful government regulation of antibiotics as feed additives, but virtually none for drinking water, he said.

European farmers obtain a veterinarians prescription, but after that theres no supervision or regulation of what farmers are doing.

He called this switch to water both worrying and presumably self-defeating if these products in fact pose a real health risk to humans.

However, it seems that consumers accept such high dosing of birds as a positive welfare issue when bird health is an issue, he said, a situation that highlights the fickle priorities of wealthy consumers.

In this regard, it seems that not allowing birds to free-range in many countries is now acceptable to consumers since the threat of personally contracting avian influenza suddenly supercedes concerns about bird welfare, he said.

Leeson said that once government regulators get over their concerns with medicines in feeds, they may turn their attention to verifying nutrient content.

Theyre going to discover we have very little confidence in the composition of feeds leaving the mill since our analytical procedures he said. Part of the reason is the long time it takes to get analytical results.

The feed is long gone and consumed, so whats needed is real time analysis and results, he said, but that kind of test for energy, which is the most important nutrient, still eludes us.

Environment concerns are also increasing, he said, with emphasis so far on phosphorous and nitrogen in manure, but he predicted that copper and zinc may also be regulated and even though the poultry industry is not a contributor, it will be swept into the regulatory regime.

Likewise, the release of ammonia from poultry houses and stored manure is now being quantitated, presumably with the intent of mitigation partly by alteration to feed formulation, he said.

Leeson said science has learned what nutrients birds require for optimum performance and said the feed sources are also well established, so further gains in productivity and efficiency are most likely to come from the genetics of the birds.

He said corn remains the dominant source of energy, even at todays much higher prices. The feed industry has lost a major source of energy because the rendering companies are selling or using their tallow and fat to produce biofuels.

He said energy might become so expensive that it will become impractical to sustain normal levels of nutrient density, and so lower-energy diets may be the only alternative.

Both layers and meat birds still eat quite precisely to their energy requirements.

He said maintaining strong and healthy skeletons will become a greater issue as breeding companies. For broilers, it may well be calcium and bone metabolism since broilers are being bred to reach market weight at an ever-younger age. The trends could lead to animal welfare issues and packing-plant difficulties for mechanical processing.

For layers, the issue is birds that lose more calcium for egg production than they can replace from diets. This will become a bigger issue if farmers persuade marketing boards to allow them to keep birds that are at a 90 per cent rate of lay beyond the current 52-weeks limit of lay.

Farmers argue that its a waste to cull these birds, but Harry Pelissero, general manager for Egg Farmers of Ontario, said privately that there are related issues such as egg quality and diverting an increased percentage of eggs from older hens to breakers and reduced demand for pullets.

Leeson said 65 per cent of the feed consumed by mature layers is for body maintenance and 80 per cent for broilers beyond 40 weeks of age.

That can be reduced by keeping barns warmer, he said. A one per cent increase in barn temperature in poultry barns during the six colder months in North and South America would reduce feed costs by $20 million a year, he said.