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Raising sustainability in the egg industry
588 Plays24 days ago
How can the egg industry improve its sustainability in a measured and recognized way? Sofie Kilroy, Ph.D., sustainability manager, for poultry Europe and Central Asia with Trouw Nutrition, discusses how in this edition hosted by Mark Clements, editor-in-chief, poultry.
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Introduction
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Future of Poultry podcast series.
00:00:12
Speaker
Hello, I'm Mark Clemens, Editor-in-Chief, Poultry with What Global Media, and today I'm joined on the Future of Poultry podcast by Sophie Kilroy, Sustainability Manager, Poultry Europe and Central Asia with Trowel Nutrition.
The Importance of Sustainability in the Egg Industry
00:00:29
Speaker
Hello Sophie, welcome to the podcast.
00:00:32
Speaker
Hi Mark, thanks for inviting me. Lovely to have you here. Now, where sustainability is concerned, the term is never far from the headlines. And today, that's exactly what we're going to look at, particularly in the layer industry. We may not always understand what's sustainable and what's not.
00:00:50
Speaker
but most of us have at least an inkling that producing sustainably is a good thing. We may already be producing sustainably without really realizing it. The egg industry does have a good reputation where sustainability is concerned. At the same time, there are plenty of businesses that are paying ever more attention to how sustainably they produce, spurred on by consumer or governmental pressures, and this group but will become ever larger.
Defining Sustainability in Egg Production
00:01:19
Speaker
Sophie,
00:01:19
Speaker
Thank you again for joining us. How does trial define sustainability with regard to egg production? Yes, well, Mark, I think that's an excellent question to start off with, just to help our listeners get on the same page. And for that, I would like to go back to the very first widely recognized definition of sustainability. And this originates from the Brundtland report in 1987, where sustainability is defined as development that meets the needs of the present.
00:01:49
Speaker
without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. And so when we reflect upon that and we extrapolate it to our layer industry, we are in the business of producing proteins and not only proteins, eggs also contain healthy fats, vitamins and minerals. I think all of our listeners would agree that eggs should be part of a healthy balanced diet.
00:02:15
Speaker
But at the same time, we do have an impact on the environment while we are producing eggs. And we have to understand better at how we are influencing the environment and try to understand how we can reduce this impact. And at the same time, we have to remain an economic viable business in order for us to produce eggs for future generations. And we must not forget to also remain producing affordable proteins because eggs are one of the most affordable proteins available for
Agriculture's Impact on Greenhouse Gases
00:02:50
Speaker
consumers. But why do we really need to be concerned about sustainability in the environment? We have been improving and reducing our our environmental environmental footprint over the years just by merely focusing on efficiency.
00:03:03
Speaker
A large part is taken up by the breeding companies who have improved their breeding line significantly over the years. But it's clear that we have to improve at a much faster pace if we want to comply to what our ah global leaders committed. But I don't know, Mark, if you have any idea to what extent our agricultural industry is contributing to these greenhouse gases. how What percentage would you attribute the agricultural industry, so not only the layer industry, to these greenhouse gases? Goodness. Sophie, hopefully you can help me with that. Well, yes, of course, Mark. It's around 12%. So we're not the the industry who has the biggest impact on these greenhouse gases, but
00:03:49
Speaker
We do have a ah huge responsibility to reduce them. And some people might wonder while we keep talking about greenhouse gases, and that is because these greenhouse gases are able to maintain heat in our atmosphere, which causes our planet to heat up and causes global warming, which in turn has an effect on the environment by causing environmental disasters, which ultimately impact our economy and our society and of course the planet. so It's clear scientists are clear that we need to do something about that. Examples of greenhouse gases are
00:04:24
Speaker
methane carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide. And scientists have also understood now how they each individually are able to maintain heat in the atmosphere. And so they have developed like a conversion factor to really talk in one single unit. And that's why everybody is talking about kilograms of CO2 equivalents with regards to greenhouse gas emissions and the carbon footprint. I hope that's clear Mark because It's not an easy topic to digest.
Reducing Carbon Footprint in Egg Production
00:04:55
Speaker
With that in mind, which are the main areas of of concern for egg production in general? well If you dissect the carbon footprint of one kilogram of eggs, you clearly see that the vast majority of one kilogram of eggs is coming from feet.
00:05:11
Speaker
And when you take a closer look at the feed component, you see that land use change is actually the biggest impact factor. but What does that mean? Crops that have been grown on land that was previously forest. So in other words, land that has been deforested, they are attributed a penalty factor in terms of land use change and that they get this penalty for 20 years. So.
00:05:36
Speaker
you could easily reduce the carbon footprint of your feed by just changing the origin of your raw materials. And it goes even that far that you can reduce up to 50%. So five zero of your carbon footprint by just choosing a different origin that is not affected by land use change. So that's only already one thing. And then when you remove the land use change, you clearly see that soy is a biggest impact factor.
00:06:04
Speaker
So we could think about alternative proteins to soy, but it's not so straightforward because some raw materials actually have larger or a higher carbon footprint than than soy. But luckily there are tools on the market that enable you to make these decisions in a very ah clear way. What would be some of the the greatest opportunities to make reductions on a layer farm?
00:06:28
Speaker
Yes, the remaining impact factors of the carbon footprint are then 10 to 20% when you look at the layer farms. And so for egg producers, they could look into the electricity usage. So first step could be to actually reduce the amount of electricity that you use. And in that way, it's a win-win situation because of course you reduce your ah economic factor and alternatively, you could also Change the source of electricity and move towards solar panels or winter beams. But in general, I would say to a producers to just continue what they have been doing always. And that is to take care of their animals in the best way and to try and improve in efficiency. ah Regardless of of the concept that you're in, whether it be.
00:07:16
Speaker
free range or in rich cages, that's the way to to move forward. When we spoke at Eurotier, you told me about specific tools that can support egg businesses and feed mills in their sustainability journey. Could we go back to that? Could you tell me a little bit about those specific tools that we talked about? So one tool is a tool to calculate the carbon footprint of feed.
00:07:41
Speaker
So we realized already a couple of years ago that feed was actually the biggest contributor to the carbon footprint of eggs. But not only eggs, also poultry and swine. there The biggest impact factor is feed.
00:07:55
Speaker
So we provided the industry in November, 2022 with this tool to calculate the footprint of feed and called it My Feedprint. And between then and now we have made several updates in order to make this tool easy to use and able to connect to different systems. So My Feedprint calculates the carbon footprint by adding up the impact coming from raw materials and adding up transportation.
00:08:20
Speaker
and then adding up the electricity usage at the feed mill plants. And if you combine this information with the information on the farm, then you're able to calculate the carbon footprint of your product.
00:08:34
Speaker
In the case of my egg prints, that's a tool that we talked about that we launched at Eurotier.
Sustainability Metrics and Regional Application
00:08:39
Speaker
You're able to calculate the carbon footprint of one kilogram of eggs. With these metrics that you mentioned, how far do they go? How deep do they go? I'm thinking, for example, and you mentioned transport. If you compare transporting feed ingredients in one country to transporting them in another, transporting one country might be far cleaner than any other.
00:09:02
Speaker
Would my egg prints go to that level of detail? Yes. Well, currently we use data coming from eco events regarding transportation modes. And so we offer two options. You could either go for the for trucks, you can choose Laurier Europe or Laurier Global, where Laurier Global has a slightly higher carbon footprint associated with it.
00:09:25
Speaker
compared to Lowery Europe. So to answer your question, yes, we go to that level of detail. But again, you have in-depth measurement, but things can be measured in a variety of ways to suit the outcomes that you may want. Why would businesses accept your measurements over those of another product? And what guarantees do they have that your measurements will be widely recognized?
00:09:48
Speaker
Our tools, ah my feet print and my egg print are based on a methodology that has been certified. So it is in accordance with ISO 1440, 1444. And I would strongly recommend the the industry to use only tools that are based on a methodology as described in the product environmental footprint category rules or the FCR where everybody is talking about.
00:10:15
Speaker
So you have the data and it's it's widely recognized, but then how do you use it to affect meaningful change at the feed mill? Well, you're right. We now have the data. We can calculate a baseline and understand where we are.
Trowel Nutrition's Role in Sustainable Practices
00:10:33
Speaker
The dashboard generated by my egg print also offers you an opportunity to understand better where the biggest impact factors are coming from, and it even offers you the possibilities to do certain changes so perform scenarios.
00:10:47
Speaker
in order to understand better what changes would impact your environmental footprints. So shouldn't Make Business decide to use my egg print? And does it actually work? Is it is a manager left alone to work things out on their own? Or does my egg print or the trail team make recommendations? Yes, we do make recommendations. And that's actually where and we make a difference. We are able to provide our customers with the best sustainable nutritional solutions.
00:11:16
Speaker
And so we go beyond just delivering a tool today. Every local market has a technical responsible person who can onboard our customers and get them up to speed with the tool. So usually customers are onboarded within 48 hours. And then we go into conversation with the customer and sometimes we even set up a partnerships to really have a meaningful impact. And maybe you wonder why we are able to ah provide our customers with this sustainable advice. And that is because.
00:11:46
Speaker
Our global research network is vast. We collaborate with a lot of universities across the world. I don't know if you have ever been ah to Spain, but we have a poultry research center over there. It's truly our hub of expertise. This is where we work together with poultry experts to drive innovations and to develop meaningful solutions that have a long lasting impact in our industry. And so that's basically the way we work. So as we discussed sustainability, zone it's a journey, it's not a destination. And with that in mind, I'm guessing that my egg print is being constantly updated as ever more data and information becomes available. That assumption would be correct. Yes. Yes. Correct. Indeed. That's our commitment also to our customers.
00:12:35
Speaker
is to continuously improve our tools based on their feedback. Across some markets, some producers are under much greater pressure than others. And in some markets, concern over ah sustainability will be something that's seen as something that's happening over there that doesn't really impact us. What message would you give for producers in those markets? pop Mark, I would just say that keep a close eye on on what's happening over here, quote unquote.
00:13:03
Speaker
And who knows how fast these these things can go. It can quickly become a reality also for those type of markets. So that's basically what I would say. Would there be one key point that you would leave our listeners with before we close? Yes, ah Mark. it's It's maybe related to your previous question regarding sustainability. This is indeed a new challenge on our horizon. And I believe we have to balance this new challenge with the ones that are already out there because They're not going away and near sustainability. And this will will require us to think different about the way we are currently working. And this is something that I personally enjoy and that is to think differently. But the good news is Mark, that you can learn how to think differently.
Engaging with Sustainability and Creative Thinking
00:13:50
Speaker
One way to do so is to think like a child. You know how a child is firstly not afraid to ask questions and they ask a lot of them.
00:14:00
Speaker
Most of those questions contain words like why or what if, and in doing so, they are able to get to the bottom of a problem without overcomplicating it. And next to that, they are also very open-minded. They never consider a pollution or an idea as too complicated or not feasible or impractical. They really have no boundaries in their mind.
00:14:25
Speaker
And you can also sometimes see how children's mind wander. And this is where they make connections between unrelated concepts. It's a bit like the hair brain and the tortoise mind, where the hair brain is the brain that we use when we are conscious, deliberately looking for solutions and we base our solutions on data analytics and we come to a quickly solution. But for more complex problems, we have to use our tortoise mind.
00:14:54
Speaker
And the tortoise mind is the the part of our brain that is active when we're doing different stuff like walking or in my case, when I go running, it's the part of our brain that allows us to be very creative and to come across unexpected connections because it's able to process a much broader context. And then finally, something that you could do is to to think differently is to engage with different groups. So to get an a different perspective.
00:15:24
Speaker
And I recently joined and beer network a professional peer networking group where we are able to share our challenges. So in my case, it's it's a group of sustainability leaders from different businesses. And I really value the way that we are able to discuss challenges and how they have come up with solutions, what worked and what did not work.
00:15:47
Speaker
And who knows, maybe some of our listeners have been listening to this podcast and have come up with some ideas that they would like to further discuss. And to those, I would say, just reach out to your local trial nutrition contact person or through our website and let's start this sustainability journey together.
Conclusion
00:16:07
Speaker
That would be my final point that I would like to make. So I think those are some really interesting ways of looking at the topic that I'm sure we will'll help our listeners view sustainability in a different light and to help them to take that sustainability efforts forward. Thank you so much for joining us today. You're welcome, Mark. Listeners, thank you all for joining us. Don't forget to look out for future editions of the Future of Poultry podcast. Until next time, goodbye.