INNOVATIVE FARMING ▶▶▶
Lack of commercialisation of technologies hindering layer productivity improvements
BY TONY MCDOUGAL D
r David Cutress, project manager at the University of Aberystwyth’s Institute of Biological, Environ- mental and Rural Sciences PreciseAg Project, says broiler systems have seen far more targeted inno-
vation and development than layer systems. These have gen- erally focused on affordable innovation as the poultrymeat industry was the fastest growing meat sector, particularly in developing countries. Dr Cutress, who is also Knowledge Ex- change Fellow for the Welsh Farming Connect programme, says one of the issues for the egg sector is that precision tools, while often affordable, have difficulty in transitioning from prototypes to commercial systems. “A key factor may be that research fails to include manufacturing companies and involves controlled, rather than commercial trials.”
Technologies in poultry He points to automation systems which are commercially available in layer management systems, providing feed, egg removal, waste removal and temperature/humidity control automatically, but which are often based on arbitrary or whole flock analysis values, which therefore need to be devel- oped further to improve productivity. There are UK compa- nies working to improve the situation, he adds: “Systems such as Flockman have been introduced commercially, integrating multiple variables into one controller, optimising control of feed levels and lighting with programmes tailored to improve profit margins in broilers”. “Fancom offers commercial automated layer systems which integrate ventilation control, feed weighing/blending, auto- matic egg counting, animal weighing and water monitoring along with software feedback to suggest management opti- misations and improvements to achieve higher productivity. Whilst currently not automated, the commercial systems of- fered by Prognostix can evaluate the conditions across a shed, or multiple sheds, including water use, localised tem- perature, humidity, airflow, light intensity and carbon dioxide levels. These systems provide alerts of health or productivity losses improving farmer intervention and, in future, could be incorporated to allow automated responses. Automation is also highly prominent at the ‘back end’ of egg production
Several technologies exist which could play a significant role in improving layer productivity but they are hampered by a lack of commercial systems and evidence of their practical benefits.
with several commercial systems available to automate egg collecting, sorting, processing and packaging, therefore im- proving the productivity and efficiency of the sector.”
Precision livestock sensors Dr Cutress says there is evidence of growing interest in preci- sion technology in the poultry sector but commercially it is lagging behind the cattle industry. Movement sensors have been assessed for use in poultry to detect abnormal behav- iour and illness, detecting avian flu earlier than using body temperature analysis. Sensors can also determine activity profiles with 98% accuracy across different laying hen breed profiles. Compared with other livestock such as cattle, initial development issues in poultry were linked to requiring tech- nology small enough to mount on the animal without caus- ing welfare issues. But technology can now be made much smaller, even enabling the development of injectable cap- sules to detect movement, as well as the temperature and heart rate of birds. Acoustic sensors have seen significant development, he adds, commercially in the pig sector but increasingly in the poultry
Many systems to improve egg farm productivi- ty are developed through research, but marketing them often lags behind.
▶ POULTRY WORLD | No. 7, 2020
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PHOTO: KOOS GROENEWOLD
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