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EP 17 Elanco: Turning ESG intent into measurable broiler performance gains
45 Plays6 days ago
In this episode of the Sustainability Hub podcast, host Tom Willings is joined by three veterinary voices connected to Elanco Animal Health: Jackie Skelly (Head of Veterinary Technical Services, UK & Ireland and ESG lead), George Gould (Technical Advisor, International Poultry Team) and George Tice (former Elanco leader, now consultant after 28 years with the company).
Together, they map the practical route from ESG intent to on-farm results.
The discussion opens by grounding ESG in the realities of European and UK regulation: net-zero trajectories, corporate sustainability reporting, due diligence duties and finance-sector disclosure frameworks.
The message is that measurement and reduction will be expected across supply chains, not just corporate offices.
From there, the panel reframes poultry’s opportunity. Chicken already delivers ~30% of global animal protein while accounting for a materially smaller share of livestock GHGs.
Yet scale and scrutiny demand continuous improvement across three pillars – economic viability, animal welfare, and environmental footprint – without “solving” one by inflating the others.
That trade-off mindset is replaced with a systems view: define the target precisely (FCR, welfare KPIs, carbon intensity), then choose interventions that move multiple pillars in the right direction.
A critical insight for operators: 70–80% of a broiler’s carbon footprint sits in feed, and ~80% of emissions occur off farm.
Energy tweaks at the house may help resilience and costs, but carbon outcomes are won primarily through feed formulation and feed efficiency.
Elanco frames its response as “inside the bird” (gut health and disease control that improve FCR) and “outside the bird” (formulation decisions that reduce the embodied carbon of the ration).
Two technology tracks illustrate this. First, Hemicell (a beta-mannanase) breaks down beta-mannans that otherwise trigger a costly feed-induced immune response and raise digesta viscosity.
By sparing energy and improving intestinal integrity, nutritionists can remove ~60 kcal from the matrix and maintain performance, enabling the substitution of higher-carbon fats/oils while maintaining output.
Independent, ISO-aligned lifecycle assessment and modelling against representative European diets indicate ~2.5–3% reductions in carbon footprint attributable to Hemicell-enabled reformulation, alongside feed-cost benefits.
Second, Elanco’s anticoccidial programmes (e.g., Maxiban®/Monoban®) anchor coccidiosis control – a health prerequisite that also supports better FCR.
Elanco commissioned ISO-conformant LCAs on the products and then collaborated with external experts to build a product-agnostic FCR-to-carbon calculator.
Teams can input live parameters (country, target weight, feed price, baseline FCR) to estimate the carbon impact of a given FCR improvement under standard diets by market.
It’s a decision tool to rank scenarios before implementing and validating with farm-level measurement platforms (e.g., poultry-specific tools that include land-use change in feed footprints).
Elanco’s approach is to:
- Keep investing in rigorous science and third-party assurance so customers can trust claimed impacts
- Quantify hidden co-benefits of health technologies (welfare ↑, performance ↑, carbon ↓)
- Develop the next wave of innovations designed explicitly for sustainability outcomes.
For producers, integrators, nutritionists and veterinary advisors, this episode offers a practical takeaway: start where the carbon is (feed), protect gut health relentlessly, use modelling to prioritise interventions, then measure and report with defensible methods.
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Transcript
Introduction & Guest Welcome
00:00:14
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to another edition of the Sustainability Hub podcast. My name is Tom Willings. Today i'm joined by another of our sponsors, Elanco Animal Health. And with me in our studio in Peterborough, I've got George Tice, George Gould and Jackie Skelly.
00:00:33
Speaker
Welcome to the podcast. Thank you. Thank thank you having We're going to do some introductions because I'm only going to make a hash if I introduce your job titles and then try and give a description. So I'll turn to each of you. Three on one is new for me. This is ah this is quite intense and and fair play to all of us. I can see we've got all got comfort blanket papers and and and diligent research and and and preparation. I bet you we don't use them, but we'll see how we go.
00:00:59
Speaker
Jackie,
Role & ESG Efforts at Elanco
00:01:00
Speaker
why don't you take us away? What what what do you do at Elanco? Thanks very much, Tom. Yeah, so I'm Jackie Skelly. and I'm Head of Vet New Technical Services for the UK and Ireland. So I look after the team of primarily vets on the ground at Lanco who do a broad range of things, but primarily look after all of our products, make sure that they are promoted and used responsibly.
00:01:18
Speaker
um as part of that role, I sit on our country leadership team and I'm kind of our champion for Lanco's um ESG, environmental, social and governance efforts there. So personal passion for this topic yeah and get to get involved in my day-to-day role as well.
00:01:30
Speaker
Fantastic. George, George Gould? So yes, I'm George Gould. I am the technical advisor in our international poultry team. So also veterinary background. And for the last six years, I've been working in the international team, um primarily from a portfolio point of view, taking care of the technical aspect of our intestinal integrity portfolio, which includes our anticoxidials.
00:01:52
Speaker
And through that, I've i've found myself in this in this space, increasingly the sustainability space, which Similar to Jackie, i'm really it's I think it's quite a steep learning curve. I'm learning a lot, but I find it a fascinating area and one that I think we can learn a lot more and do a lot more. So yeah, very glad to be Fantastic.
00:02:08
Speaker
Last but not least, George? Well, Tom, actually, I i don't work for Elanco directly now. i'm ah I'm a consultant for them, but I did work for them for a terribly long time, 28 years. And I spent a significant part of that time working in the poultry industry and then in regulatory and public policy following that, particularly um supporting the Elanco's feed additive portfolio ah from a policy and regulatory perspective.
00:02:33
Speaker
um Since I finished with Elanco three years ago, i have been consulting with them and I've had the privilege of helping Elanco think through how to position their products in terms of sustainability. always was a passion of mine and so I'm delighted to be here to discuss it.
00:02:48
Speaker
You're also on a veterinary background. I'm also a vet. I'm also a vet. It's three vets. another Three vets around the table. I'm cooked. I'm another vet. Another vet. Yeah. yeah and Who wants to tackle the, who is Elanco? Let's just tell everyone about Elanco.
Elanco's Sustainable Solutions Overview
00:03:03
Speaker
Jackie, I'll come to you. Yeah, I'm happy happy to talk about that a little bit. So and for anyone that's not aware, Elanco is, I guess, a dedicated animal health company. So we um are one of the market leaders across all different species. We produce a range of pharmaceutical and nutritional products.
00:03:17
Speaker
and yeah across a range of species from um companion animals through to ruminants and of course um to poultry and swine which is a big focus area for us. so and We're leading company top four in all of the major markets internationally. So if you have products for animals, the chances are you have some of our products on your shelf. and And we're very much an innovation led organisation. So huge amounts of our and investment is into that research and development um area. So we're we're constantly bringing new products to market, new services, new way of doing things. That's way the way that we like to um operate and to think, I guess, as an organisation as well.
00:03:51
Speaker
ah Today's about sustainability. yeah So we're here to to try and sort of narrow our conversation on that on on that topic. But go on, what's the what's the link in with sustainability through Elanco?
00:04:02
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think there's several links. I mean, I think, first of all, it's a focus for us as an organisation. I think we're very aware in that market leading position that we need to have our own house in order. And we have sustainability front and centre from a governance perspective, very senior roles. And looking after that, we've done a lot of work ah over the last few years in terms of calculating our baseline, understanding where we stand at the moment and starting to put measures in place to get our own.
00:04:24
Speaker
house in order, our footprint under control, whether that's energy, whether that's wastewater, and packaging, etc. and But I think dwarfed by that is the potential that we have as an organisation who works with farmers and producers around the world to actually help them on their own journey to cut emissions and to produce livestock more sustainably to meet that increasing global demand. So very, very exciting area of research for us is really thinking about what we can do with our existing portfolio, but also in the future,
00:04:51
Speaker
um to actually really directly benefit farmers with more sustainable protein production on the ground. Yeah, i'm I'm indebted to all of you for the material that you sent me in advance. It's it's given me you know plenty of evening's worth of ah of of of reading. Didn't send me to sleep, Georgia, and that's not what I'm saying. but I'll leave you these bits of paper after. Yeah, I probably shows how little I knew to start with. and And I don't know a great deal more now. But my word of I learned a lot through through reading it. So let's let's try and make sure that we yeah talk to all of the products and all of those benefits, because the the sense I get is that your little bit in the in as a feed additive in, the in the in um you know, in the diet that's being fed to to all of these birds.
00:05:32
Speaker
That little bit has an enormous effect on the sustainability of the chicken that, you know, so many people are consuming. So, yeah, we'll look forward to getting into that conversation. Sustainability is a big, big kind of word, means all sorts of different things. There is a big picture here. I don't know if we want to just talk about how we define sustainability for the benefit of the conversation ahead.
Defining Sustainability in Poultry
00:05:53
Speaker
Yeah, well, that i'll I'll have a go at that, um Tom. We... Environmental social governance that Jackie referred to, I suppose that's where sustainability originally is defined. So what is the environmental, social elements of a company's practice and how do they govern themselves?
00:06:11
Speaker
And I would say that on the environmental and social side, for us in in the poultry industry and for those of us who serve the poultry industry, what it then divides down into is economic sustainability.
00:06:25
Speaker
sustainability. Number one, do poultry producers and poultry farmers, do they can they have and do they have economically sustainable businesses that can people? Are they making a profit? Yeah, and continue to employ people.
00:06:38
Speaker
Can they produce affordable, high quality poultry meat for the for for the community? And then... So that that that and that that's economic. And then, of course, there's um the social or the ethical side.
00:06:53
Speaker
And I think what we so we see, we would see in poultry, is that welfare is a huge part of that. yeah So... the broader community, those who look at both the poultry industry and those who supply the poultry industry want to know about animal welfare and is it improving?
00:07:09
Speaker
And related to that, again, something we're very involved in is antibiotic use. yeah So antimicrobial resistance is a concern and relates to food safety. So that's... um That's the sort of ethical side, the economic side, and then, of course, the environmental side, which we're going to end up talking about more. But there's a lot that goes into that, and we'll talk about it more. But the footprint, obviously, we'll talk about the carbon footprint, but there's much else that is involved in understanding the environmental footprint of the poultry industry and how a company like Elanco can help to address that.
Global Sustainability Goals Impact
00:07:40
Speaker
Yeah, um I wonder if it's worth just diving straight into that footprinting side of things, because you know the carbon em emissions calculations, et cetera, that they are, well, they've become the way that we measure sustainability in in adverted commas, because it allows us to benchmark where we are today and and set milestones for where we want to be tomorrow. And we're, of course, we're aiming at some pretty long term global solutions.
00:08:06
Speaker
goals. is Is that right? Yeah, well, absolutely. and Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the the context is compelling and it started, yeah we all know this, it started in Paris, well it didn't, it started before that but COP21, Paris, the Paris Agreement um limited limit kind temperature increase to two degrees above pre-industrial levels and then what happened of course is that that then fed down into legal frameworks and legislations in countries and for us here in in Europe and in the UK and so then
00:08:43
Speaker
countries, the European Union and the UK, have made their own commitments which are legally binding yeah in terms of GHG reductions, net zero by 2050 for the yeah UK.
00:08:56
Speaker
And I see now just recently the European Commission have um proposed a 90% reduction in GHG by 2040. And these are legally binding requirements. Like it or not, we're going there. Yes. And and then what's what's happened after that is then that is then fed down into legislation.
00:09:13
Speaker
And I think you talked about how uniquely pressurized this environment in Western Europe is are in terms of sustainability because of, ah we'll talk about it later, but the preferred concern about intensification but also what is unusual about here in this part of the world is we we're going to regulate it so there's the European corporate sustainability reporting directive, there's the EU sustainability due diligence directive, there's the UK sustainability reporting standards which are you know parallel that very very much, there's a carbon disclosure mechanisms, there's a cross-border
00:09:50
Speaker
adjustment mechanisms that are coming. So these are all coming which will require companies to um measure and to and to reduce. yeah And if you're part of those supply chains, you need to be ready.
00:10:03
Speaker
and can't Come up a level and look at the banks and and is it TCFD, Task Force for Climate-Related Financial Disclosure. that They are going to be the um yeah what what's the word, you know the the lowest common denominator, that probably sounds like. That's it.
00:10:18
Speaker
That's every business yeah captured immediately. you know They need to demonstrate that they're lending sustainably, responsibly. And yeah we're all going to be playing by the same book of cards. But when we regulate over here, in whether this country or or Europe, we tend to then mean it, don't we? We tend to then try our absolute best to deliver against the promises. And there has been a sort of even in the European Parliament, there's been a bit of a right, not in the UK Parliament, but a bit of a right-wing shift, obviously in the US s a significant right-wing shift, which has tried to back off that somewhat.
00:10:51
Speaker
But it hasn't, um all that will happen is ah maybe a delay in implementation, an effort to make it more simple. yeah But it will not negate that in Western Europe, including the UK, we will need to we will need to measure and reduce.
Challenges in Poultry Sustainability
00:11:06
Speaker
we we need to We need to bring this back to chickens because you know that these um big picture um regulatory changes on the on the back of a very obviously necessary um yeah pressure in terms of addressing climate change are are incredibly relevant to us in our market producing the food that we are all involved with producing firstly 30% protein consumed you know is is is chicken
00:11:37
Speaker
and um Secondly, we operate in a value chain, a supply chain, going through a handful of very, very large businesses with an awful lot of reputational um kind of risk at stake. um and And we as an industry have got to play our part in delivering for them as our customers, you know, to to um improve the job.
00:12:00
Speaker
How do Elanco and their products play into that for your customers? I just had one in there. Those big companies have made very clear commitments, which are more aggressive, in fact, than the government commitments in their... in but Almost competitive. Yes, yeah. you know So very, very clear commitments. So you're dead right, Tom. Sorry. i think right Coming back to what what you were saying, Tom, as you rightly say, poultry chicken is now the the most widely eaten meat ah globally and has been for a number of years. I think it was around 2018 it surpassed 4.
00:12:29
Speaker
And it's I think it's important to say that it's already a pretty, in terms of benchmarking against other sources of protein, it's already a very sustainable ah sustainable source of protein. But of course, we as an industry need to do better, particularly as it becomes more and more widely eaten.
00:12:42
Speaker
um I'm going to throw the stats out again. It was 30% of protein consumption is chicken. Yes. 8% of livestock greenhouse gases are from chicken. So 30% bang.
00:12:53
Speaker
And that tells the story in itself, right? but Yeah. Chicken is a very relatively sustainable... source of protein but of course we can continue to do better and I think one of the challenges that um speaking to ah producers our customers effectively um is that this word sustainability is incredibly broad and um I suppose listening to what George said and and yourself Tom um when we think about those three pillars social which would include a a you know big chunk of that would be animal welfare which is which is very high on the agenda um then economic, of course, the business needs to remain sustainable, but also environment. That's when most, when you speak to at a consumer level, most people, when they hear the word sustainability, will think about greenhouse gas emissions. absolutely I guess the question I'd have is with the legislative framework, the regulatory framework coming down from, I suppose, from governmental level and now being picked up at a retail level as well, that slightly sharpens the focus of
00:13:46
Speaker
areas we really need to be specific and trying to improve. And I think that's one of the things when we spent some time with customers last year is that this, we all heard the word sustainability, sustainability a lot.
00:13:56
Speaker
um But the feedback from the customers at that moment in time was, we're still not exactly clear where the destination we're trying to get to is yeah and how we get there. And so it's very difficult to to make progress if there's not much clarity. So I think having a framework, having a clear target, having a clear way of measuring is critically important. And knowing when we're talking about sustainability, what are we talking about? Is it footprint?
00:14:19
Speaker
Is it welfare? and let Let's be very specific and clear in that. Can I just ask for a definition on a customer, just for anyone that's listening? I mean, who would you say are your customers? um I think Jackie and I would probably give different answers. with order so like Let's do both. answer of the business um So for me, my you know I've grown up in Elanco in the poultry sector almost entirely and and specifically within the broiler sector. So my customers ah with our portfolio would would inevitably be the integrators. So the yeah the poultry farmers and the integrators.
00:14:49
Speaker
um So yeah that would be... And then Jackie? Yeah, I mean, I think it does depend on different parts of business. You're right. But I think certainly... I guess across the board, the the veterinary sector very much are are a big target for a lot of our products and that's an area of um I guess, an area of um our stakeholders who are really concerned about sustainability. So I think it's really important that we're having that conversation there as well. But I think when you look at Elanco's kind of wider vision and purpose, that goes all the way down to the end consumer or the end owner of animals. I think we you know we we talk about making life better and that very much comes down to that end use of of whatever product we might be talking about. So I think our customer base is very broad. I think that makes it very exciting. But again, I think we need to think
00:15:29
Speaker
When we talk about this topic, who are we speaking to? And and acknowledge that you could be you could be talking to anybody in the value chain. Let's just go back to that uncertainty that you just referred to there, George, because I think there's an interesting point. And I wonder if it's maybe this is contentious, but it it is um is any of that uncertainty from your customers, if I take them as the integrators, does that come from...
00:15:50
Speaker
you know, this sort of UK and Western Europe demand for slower growing, um you know, de-stocked, reduced stocking density sheds so and and the clear conflict between um most efficient products production and a rounded version of sustainability that takes yl puts greater emphasis on you know perceived welfare or the availability of best welfare outcome measures, etc. Is that why you think there might be?
00:16:18
Speaker
And if not, then what what is causing that uncertainty? I'd certainly say that's one of the one of the main challenges is is is ensuring that we have clarity on what we're trying to achieve, but also make sure that we have joined up thinking. It's no good fixing a problem in one area if it creates a problem in another.
00:16:32
Speaker
I think I remember ah ah an ex-colleague of ours who was working in this space some years ago, first described sustainability in the three pillars that George has mentioned as, think of it like three balloons that are all interconnected. If you squeeze hard on one, you're putting more air and more pressure on the other two.
00:16:47
Speaker
and i think There are some instances where there will be a trade-off and we have to decide what is it exactly we're trying to achieve, but be mindful of what that does in terms of other areas. So you mentioned um the focusing very much on animal welfare.
00:17:01
Speaker
If the way we achieve that is through downstocking or using slower growing breeds, then we need to be mindful of what that does in terms of ah the economic aspect of of poultry production, the affordability for the consumer, um but also the carbon footprint of that production. If we're if we're growing birds more slowly and they're perhaps less efficient, they might be seen as better from a welfare, but how does that impact the carbon footprint? And there probably is no perfect answer, but we just need to be mindful and joined up on that.
00:17:24
Speaker
Yeah. George, you're going to come in there.
00:17:29
Speaker
No, not especially, although I do think it comes back, you're talking about focus, I think, if is it fair to say at the moment, we we have ended up focusing very much ah in terms of the value we, well, Elanco has in terms of the value it tries to create for customers through its products on indeed the carbon footprint element at this point.
Carbon Footprint Reduction in Poultry
00:17:49
Speaker
Now there's a lot there's a lot of other things obviously and of course antimicrobial resistance, welfare, very important and the other elements of environmental environmental commitments such as water, nitrogen, phosphorus, such a be big thing at the moment. But we've ended up focusing and trying to understand what the cost what the ah the products do in terms of carbon footprint.
00:18:13
Speaker
Yeah. And so what's that process undertaken, George? want Well, I would have thought George might be quite good to talk to this because of the sort of theory that you've thought through around the importance of bird health and sustainability. Yes, I mean, I think that, um as you say, broad topic, but we're quite focused at the moment on not only the environment environmental aspect, but within that, the carbon footprint, the carbon emissions aspect of it. and And that certainly, I think one of the reasons is that universally, globally, that is
00:18:46
Speaker
There are different companies that are at a granular level will have other things they're focused on, whether that be welfare or other other areas of sustainability. But but carbon footprint is pretty universal at the moment, in in the certainly in broiler production and poultry more widely. So um we've really focused in on that. um And I think one of the learnings I've had over the last perhaps two, three years of working in this space and actually listening to another one of your podcasts with some colleagues from Trowne was that very much reinforced what we'd already heard and what we'd already learned, which is 80% of the carbon footprint of broader production happens off
00:19:20
Speaker
off the farm. So it's really interesting to me that when I first started in this space and speaking to customers and trying to learn from them, what are what are they doing? i Probably the buzzwords I heard more often than the k not were solar panels, wind turbines and looking at energy sources. and actually, when you really get into it, you realize that Of course, those things are great and they're admirable, but they're going to they're a drop in the ocean compared to actually where the real source of carbon is. When you're when you're talking about a carbon footprint, it might be a really good idea from ah from a business resilience point of view, from a security of supply, from a cost management point of view, but from a carbon footprint. a footprint It's making a relatively negligible difference. It's all about feed.
00:19:56
Speaker
It's all about feed. So eighty seventy between 70 and 80% of the carbon footprint of a chicken is is the feed you put in in in front of it. So um that then led us to to thinking about, ah kind of sharpened our focus a little, if you like, you in terms of we need to do we need to make sure we're doing things which make the bird more efficient with the feed.
00:20:13
Speaker
and we need to do things to reduce the absolute carbon footprint of the feed. yeah And so that then, the way we frame that in Elanco is ah as an inside the bird strategy and an outside the bird strategy. um And that's, I suppose, is the the backbone of where we are in terms of our work with customers on that. your your Your products have stood the test of time, haven't they? They've got enormous uptake.
00:20:32
Speaker
I don't know. Some of them are pretty old. Some of them are old enough. Some of them are old enough. Yep, yep. ah But again, they're focused on the efficiency of feed. And I and i would imagine at the point that they were they were they were introduced and and and have been so widely adopted, it's because they deliver that economic benefit. There is a clear, you know,
00:20:52
Speaker
yeah Yes, well, I mean, I think there's always this, I talked about this as an innovation company, and then it's funny that you point this out, because absolutely some of our still most innovative products actually are very old. And I think it's, some you know, it's sometimes tempting to jump on the bandwagon of the next big thing, but that's not always the right way to go, actually, I think sometimes.
00:21:09
Speaker
but But what you, I think, from ah if I were a customer, whether whether I was a ah retailer or I was in the in the in the chain in between the grower and the retailer, I'd take enormous confidence from the fact that they have stood the test of time um and and the science behind their creation, but but also then the research that you've done subsequently that then puts another string to the bow from this you know new aspect of sustainability.
00:21:35
Speaker
and you know measures their impact or measures the the impact of their production and and the net impact of then their deployment in the field. Well, absolutely. and I think it's important to recognise that you mentioned the sort of the economic aspect um in with regard to the products, but it's important that to understand that certainly the products we're dealing with you know today are all rooted in, first and foremost, in tackling a a health challenge. or in the birds themselves. So they're they're rooted in in improving animal health. first Are you going to talk about what the products are? Tell us what those products are. We certainly can. but What I wanted to say is that do you know that there's there's ah there's a kind of common thread with all of this, which we're kind of learning as we go in sustainability, that first and foremost, products that improve animal health. So we'll talk about coccidiosis, for example, would be want one area. It's a ubiquitous challenge right in in chicken production, in broiler production. um And anti-coccidials in a strong program is is crucial to, first and foremost, protect the health of the bird.
00:22:29
Speaker
Now, a ah as ah as a result of having better gut health, reduced disease challenge, um you are going to get better performance and that yields an economic benefit. um And that's obviously fairly straightforward and something we've been aware of for for decades. and And so we've almost been, if you like,
00:22:46
Speaker
positioning those products on those two fronts. So looking after animal health, intestinal integrity is a phrase you'll hear from Milankov a lot, and and yeah and yielding better performance as a result. What we've learned recently is that, there's as you mentioned, there's kind of ah another string to the bow here, which is because feed is such a large chunk of the carbon, ah the carbon cost of producing poultry, if we can improve the gut health,
00:23:10
Speaker
it inevitably leads to better feed efficiency, better feed conversion ratio in those birds, which has an economic benefit for the customers, but also a carbon reduction benefit. And so effectively, like having good gut health, for me, as I'm a little bit biased, because I've had 11 years working in the intestinal integrity space. But for me, intestinal integrity is one of those areas where actually across those three pillars, we don't have to make trade-offs. If you've got better gut health, the birds are going to be healthier.
00:23:34
Speaker
and So you've got better welfare. They are going to be more a higher performing flock so you're going to have more profitability and they're going to use less feed to produce the same amount of protein so you're going to have less carbon footprint so for me there's a win-win-win there rather than looking at trade-offs so I think gut health I've always been passionate about gut health and now I'm even more so now we're bringing in sustainability so yeah absolutely yeah And your customers, that your customers will obviously love the efficiency gain.
00:24:02
Speaker
Do you want to talk through you know the lifecycle analyses that you've done and the and the and the supporting evidence that says this isn't just good from ah um a performance point of view, actually this is great from a planetary point of view as well?
00:24:14
Speaker
um you i could i I can make a start and then I think i'll probably hand to George because he he's been heavily involved in this as well. but I think before we started, before we wanted to get into did did looking at the benefits of our products through a lens of sustainability, it's important to so to I think not least from a credibility point of view, but also to know what the net impact of our products is to to look at their own footprint and the own the footprint of our own operation. So I think um we can talk about both the product i aspect to that and also the wider operation part of that with George and Jackie. Yes, I think the most of the investment that Elanco has made has been actually in the HemiCell product range. yeah
00:24:51
Speaker
which is beta-mannanase, so it digests beta-mannans which are antinutritive factors and if they li are left undigested they induce a feed-induced immune response which reduces the effectiveness of nutrient digestion.
00:25:06
Speaker
and um So that's the first one, we'll talk more about that, the hemicelle portfolio. And the second one, and Maxiban and Montiban, which are the heart of the Elanco's anticoxidial portfolio.
00:25:17
Speaker
So we've looked, or Elanco have invested, to look at both but life cycle a lifecycle assessment of the product, the manufacturing process, but also a way of understanding what the impact of that product will be on carbon footprint. We know the health and the performance benefits now, and and therefore the economic benefit, and that's why the products are sold.
00:25:42
Speaker
But what about the carbon footprint benefit? So, as you said, there are two steps to that. The first step is you have to do a lifecycle assessment on the products set on the products themselves because you need to know what's going in. yeah And indeed, we we contracted ah Blanc- sustainability consultants and for the products, the feed additive products, they um worked very hard with our manufacturing sites and our distribution process and they applied the appropriate guidelines ISO 144044 and 144040, also the LEAP guidelines on LCA life cycle assessment of feed additives and the product environmental footprint category rules for feed that the European Union have published. So those were applied
00:26:28
Speaker
They use their agri-footprints database to calculate what the environmental impact of the manufacture of these products is. Carbon's part of it, obviously water, acidification, eutrophication, et cetera, as well. And those are now um available.
00:26:44
Speaker
We know the data. They were, as part of the ISO processor, independent independently reviewed. And you know we we make those available to customers so they know, well, Alanco make those available to customers so the customers know what's going in It's a big investment, again, in the in the trustworthiness, the credibility of those results. Firstly, with with with the firm that you've chosen to actually undertake that work.
00:27:09
Speaker
Blanc would be, I'm sure, recognized as the leader in in that space. um And, yeah, Elanco would come off incredibly well with having been you know rigorous enough to to to have that measured and be in a place to talk about it from an informed Yeah, no, a it's a, you know, as you would know, it's a detailed assessment. You've got, a you know, all the inputs, raw materials, energy, and then the outputs, water, waste, plastic, packaging. You know, it's a huge process, with ah but see as in many industries with lots and lots of lines in a spreadsheet.
00:27:49
Speaker
and And you you you then have to make sure that the methodology you use is validated and you use an external consultant, an external expert to do that. So you've got your measures for your products. Yeah. OK. So then we looked at the impact of the products.
Lifecycle Assessment Tools in Use
00:28:07
Speaker
I've done an awful lot of reading. I'd like to say I'd throw my hat in the ring as an enthusiastic amateur if you want me to talk about Hemicell. You can give it a go if you want. Or we can just hope no nutritionist listening and they'll haul me over the cold. I've never heard the word beta mananase before. Hemicell is a beta mananase. It's enzyme. It's an enzyme.
00:28:23
Speaker
Right. And it's ah it's a beta mananase. which I think, please correct me if I get this wrong, George, but so there are beta mannans present in many ah raw ingredients that that we put in poultry feed. Now, beta mannans are quite interesting because they they they have, this where we're going to get a bit technical, Tom. So they have, I can already hear our nutritional technical consultant on my shoulder. They're not in the room, so let's go. um so so So beta mannans are interesting because they they have some molecular patterns on their surface.
00:28:51
Speaker
which to the bird's immune system are very closely related or similar to some pathogen molecular patterns. So essentially something called a pathogen associated molecular pattern or a PAMP, which are PAMP, which ah the the bird's immune system looks at beta mannan, which is just a harmful piece of you know the raw ingredient, but it sees a pathogen and it switches on its immune system.
00:29:11
Speaker
Now that immune system has a cost. And effectively, if there's beta mannans present in the diet at a high enough level, it can cause an immune response which wastes energy up to about three percent of metabolizable energy.
00:29:24
Speaker
um Now, this is this is usually inefficient. It also causes problems in terms of viscosity of the digester in the gut, in terms of the inflammation in the gut. So generally you lose a bit of intestinal integrity, you're losing a bit of broiler efficiency.
00:29:35
Speaker
ah So what Hemacel does is it it takes that beta manan, which is a long chain, it cuts it into lots of little pieces so the bird can no longer recognize it as a as as a pathogen, even though it's not. It's essentially a very costly say costly example of mistaken identity.
00:29:50
Speaker
um And so HEMICELL prevents that from happening and essentially
00:29:57
Speaker
spares that spares that loss of energy. um Now, one way you can use HEMICEL is you can take energy out of the diet, put HEMICEL back in and effectively maintain the performance while lowering feed costs.
00:30:08
Speaker
But also the things you've taken out, the fats and oils you may have taken out, depending on what they are, depending on the diet, and that's the caveat i'm putting in here, um they may have high carbon element, kind high carbon costs as well. And Hemisar has a low carbon cost. So you're getting net carbon improvement as well as net cost.
00:30:23
Speaker
So if we're talking about the the the biggest potential gain, it's taking out something like soy oil, soybean meal, which of course attached to that is going to be a likely a fairly hefty land use change contribution and even just a little bit of hemicell and a little bit of soy taken out suddenly big improvement in carbon footprint and everything's relative I mean we're looking at incremental there's no I think we talked about this before there's no there's no one silver bullet that's gonna suddenly reduce our carbon footprint by 30 40 percent but if we can do things which make inroads into the feed the footprint of the feed Well, if it's 5% of feed conversion ratio over here and it's a couple of percent on carbon footprint over there, then it all adds doesn't it? It all starts right up, exactly.
00:31:08
Speaker
Can I be a little bit nerdy? is that the the The important thing, I believe, was that when what what we we again went through an ISO process on the estimate of the likely impact on a representative diet in Europe. So we had an independent nutritionist do two things. Firstly, validate that he took...
00:31:27
Speaker
60 kilocalories of energy out of the matrix, there would be no performance change. And then he adapted the darts accordingly. Those darts were then fed into the SimaPro system, which again was consistent with the product environmental foot footprint category rules.
00:31:47
Speaker
by Blanc Consultants and they came out with the 2.5% figure. So it was again, and that was then externally reviewed by by a consultant. So it was done again to the ISO standards and Elanco can be very confident that in in in In many diets, there will be a 2.7 to 3.3 reduction in the carbon footprint associated with the inclusion of hemicell.
00:32:13
Speaker
So they really, Blanco, worked hard to get that validated so they could become confident as they spoke to their customers. So that's hemicell. And then Maxaban, Montaban, same thing. So same same thing again, very similar process.
00:32:27
Speaker
The first thing was to do the lifecycle assessment of the manufacturing sites, the manufacture of the products, the bags, the bags of Maxaban, bags of Montaban, anticoxidyl that goes to the customers.
00:32:40
Speaker
Same guidelines. So it's the same process that I described with HemiCell. So we then understood that customers understand what's going in. But in terms of the measurement of the impact, the focus, and we worked a lot on this, trying to figure this one out, didn't we, George? The focus was on FCR and trying to model if if the customer could think, was satisfied that this would be the FCR impact of improving his intestinal health associated with the use of a a program using these products, what would that mean? don't know if you want to talk about that. Yeah, light bulb moment is probably too strong a term, but I think there's certainly a realization through the journey we've all been on in sustainability that, anchoring back to that really important point that feed is the single biggest source of carbon for poultry production.
00:33:26
Speaker
If we can be more efficient with it, i.e. improving our FCR, or use less of it to create the same amount of protein, then then then there's gains to be made in carbon footprint. um Now,
00:33:38
Speaker
ah I've been working with the branding that you mentioned Maxiband for 11 years. um And what we have, what we tend to do commercially or demonstrate commercially is that this product through better coccidiosis control, stronger coccidiosis control, we yield a better feed efficiency of the of the broiler um as the as the primary metric that our producers that our customers are really interested in so when we're talking about max switching to maxiban or changing to a longer maxiban program invariably the question is what's that going to do to my fcr and
00:34:11
Speaker
historically we've always taken that and trans i suppose translated that into an economic number you know cents per bird pence per bird whatever it may be um what we realized in this space is that not only is there an economic gain to be had but there's also a carbon footprint reduction gain so we worked uh we worked very closely again with with blonde consultancy to to try and develop a uh a calculator yeah um which which was actually agnostic of product and agnostic of solution, simply saying, yeah in under these given conditions, so let's assume you're growing a 2.2 kilo broiler and you're paying X pounds per tonne per feed, um in the UK, under UK production conditions, standard UK diet, what if we could somehow implement a solution which would reduce reduce or improve the FCR by five points, let's say,
00:35:05
Speaker
what would that do economically, which they already know by and large, but what would that do in terms of carbon footprint? And I think that's a really useful tool to have just to start to quantify.
00:35:16
Speaker
And it's not a measuring tool, right? It's not it's not like, I know there's lots of measuring tools out there. It's not a not a promise. It's not a measurement. But it's it's indicative of if we could find a solution which did that to FCR, what would it do to our footprint? and And then we obviously have lots and lots of data which demonstrates by having a more appropriate program in place to control gut health, intestinal integrity, coccidiosis, you can expect changes in FCR of the magnitude of whatever it may be. And so we're just trying to tie those things together with this calculator. So this calculator is not yet in in its full formed.
00:35:47
Speaker
No, it is. it It is. And we use it. we We have used it with customers yet. But as I said, it's totally agnostic of product. So it's simply plug in bird weight, feed cost, ah the the country you're producing chicken in. So it's a global calculator.
00:35:59
Speaker
and And we work with Blanc to run a series of predictive models based on standard diets in each of those countries and standard conditions in those countries to generate what the footprint would be if you improved the FCR from a baseline of ah that you select as well. So, yeah.
00:36:14
Speaker
Indicative. So obviously, and I know you'd be very familiar with this, then companies can then go on to look at it themselves, right? Because they'll have their own feed formulation and be able to assess feed conversion impact using their feed conversion, their feed formulation.
00:36:30
Speaker
I can imagine a tool like that being incredibly valuable to your customers because this whole decarbonisation as though that's just ah ah a one-off decision. But it's not. This is a very, very slow process of incremental change and scenario modelling with something that can be agnostic and you know just be applied with the next process.
00:36:52
Speaker
the next theory, it would be a very powerful way of you know trying to determine what your strategy is to to you know edge away at this 30% reduction. I'm glad you said that, Tom. that Well, you certainly hope so. That was the intention behind building. That's very validating. But ah no, i i I think that almost the the key...
00:37:11
Speaker
objective, from my perspective, is is sometimes there's a there's that trade-off that we talked about, that that that it's seen as you can't be economically sustainable and environment environmentally sustainable. And actually, there are some areas where there's a win-win. And I think if we can...
00:37:27
Speaker
as long as it's not compromising somewhere else, if we can find solutions which can improve feed efficiency, clearly there's massive carbon benefits. And it's just about getting people to see when they're making those decisions about, do I want to invest in my, a little bit more in my feed costs to achieve an FCR improvement? It's no longer just the economic gains. It's the, it's the other benefits that come with that. and that's kind of where I'd really like people to reach is to to use that calculator to, to look at the full suite of benefits of doing this rather than just focusing purely on the economics.
00:37:56
Speaker
And is there ah is there a corporate level consideration here as well about being the one to provide these tools and being the authority in not only the product from ah an efficiency point of view and from a health point of view, but also from a
Elanco's Long-term Sustainability Commitment
00:38:09
Speaker
sustainability point of view? Is it is it is it kind of how Elanco wants to be seen corporately? Yeah, very much. I think back again, because it is that win, win, win, really. And I think we're very aware as leaders in the market that we we want to lead by example and hopefully others will follow when there's a positive feedback loop there. But yeah, i mean, we've been very clear and our CEO has been very clear on a number of occasions that sustainability is absolutely...
00:38:30
Speaker
a core strategic focus for us for the next 10 years if not beyond um so yeah i think we you know that that commitment is unwavering and i think we we talk about innovation in terms of products but also in terms of tools and services and support and i think we've always had that mindset quite entrepreneurial i guess of let's come up with new ways of doing things and new ways of looking at it and i think we will continue to learn from experiences like this to take that and expand it elsewhere and Yeah, for sure. I think the message I'd give from a Lanco perspective is that that focus on sustainability won't be going away. It's a really exciting place for us and for a lot of different reasons and hopefully for our customers as well.
00:39:05
Speaker
And how important is chicken? I mean, Lanco Animal Health, massive, massive organisation, multi-species, but just how important is chicken in that whole ESG? Yeah, really important. i mean, we've balanced our our portfolio is pretty balanced now across companion animal and farm. But I think on that farm side, we still have a really significant. um Yeah, I don't know if you've got you probably know the more up to date stats than me, George, but chicken has historically been a huge part of our business. And that certainly isn't going away.
00:39:31
Speaker
um I think we're going to see more and more innovation and focus in this space um going forward. Certainly outside the US and in across Asia, um it's all about a huge amount of the land coast business is chicken and investment is chicken.
00:39:46
Speaker
Yeah. yeah Although I don't know if wet if we want to go into the sort of in terms of the UK portfolio, there are products which which we where we don't have here, but in yeah other parts of the world, i don't know if Jackie wanted to speak to. Yeah. I mean, I think we won't get down to the granular product level, but I think, I mean,
00:40:01
Speaker
In the US, the big ah there's a huge opportunity in cattle sustainability. Obviously, cattle production is very different in the US compared to the UK. And we already have some products on the market there with some really exciting direct sustainability benefits, whether that's some reduction in methane emissions or reduction in ammonia, et cetera. So looking at it very much across all species and on the farm side, but I think and we we will see more.
00:40:23
Speaker
you know There's lots of investment going on in the poultry space as well. So I think we'll see more coming out of there. it's you know we We hear a lot of noise. We're a US headquartered. company So a lot of what you'll hear from a global point of view originates with that US market and the US investor in mind. But actually, we're pretty balanced internationally between the US s being about 50% of our business and the rest of the world being the other 50%. And that diversity, if you like, is one of our strengths. So um yeah, what what you hear isn't always um necessarily what's reflective of what's going on in the background, I suppose, is fair to say. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
00:40:55
Speaker
Tom, question for you, just going back to what you said about um the the the calculator tool that we've dev developed and is is kind of ready to use and out there. Are customers kind of grabbing it? is Is it a big opportunity? I think i think it it is to a degree, but I think in in its strength or it becomes even more compelling a proposition to a customer if it can be paired with a really accurate measurement tool at the other end of the process. So the way I see it is that you use the calculator to demonstrate, hey, we could perhaps do something with your program or with some products or with some interventions which would improve your FCR by X points.
00:41:30
Speaker
The model shows us that that will give us an improvement in footprint in the range of X in terms of you know using using the model we've got. And then you implement that solution and then you measure it very accurately using one of the tools out there. I know Eggbase is one of them. is The challenge I think we have at the moment, and again, I saw this on on a previous podcast you you you did, which was, oh do you think we're getting close to a point where there there is enough standardization in the way we measure and the way people report?
00:41:57
Speaker
footprint at a print at ah at a and of meat production level, at a poultry production level. and How do we get there? Yeah, wow. What a question. What a question. um Do I think there's enough harmonisation? think um there is room for improvement.
00:42:10
Speaker
Absolutely. and in um across all of the calculators, I think there are very, very different purposes behind the development of of each. You know, you take Eggbase as the example, and and obviously I'm employed by Eggbase, so I should declare that to anyone who didn't know that was was listening.
00:42:29
Speaker
um You know, our tool is um unashamedly specific to poultry and poultry farming. And so our boundary, and boundary is the crucial world word in anything to do with emissions reporting.
00:42:43
Speaker
and our boundary is absolutely square around the building or the pasture if the birds have got access to range. Whereas you go and look at some of the other tools and they are more whole farm and of incredible complexity because there's all sorts of breadth of activity taking place on that farm.
00:43:01
Speaker
um and And they'll be far more um detailed in terms of yeah soil treatments and um yeah things that are outside of a typical poultry farm boundaries so immediately you've got a mismatch in terms of the the the purpose and the design of of those tools i think from a feed point of view you come back to um you know feed being 75 80 percent of of the the report on a poultry farm um i'd say there there's pretty good
00:43:34
Speaker
harmonization you know there is a single kind of best-in-class database that everyone uses you know gfl for for feed raw materials the supply chain the operational delivery from from you know the point that those crops are grown to ah consumption um is a relatively minor part of the overall emissions and yes there's lots of different ways of people kind of calculate that but i think um the end result is still a comparable number in most cases. So long as land use change is included, and that's, DEFRA did a harmonisation report um that was published 18 months or so ago, and and and it was incredible to see that I think there were only half a dozen agricultural calculators shortlisted, and there was inconsistency at that point as as to whether land use change was or wasn't included. I think those days are done.
00:44:27
Speaker
So land use change now would would be as standard would be included. i yeah I can't speak for every tool that's on the market, but I'd be very surprised if there were still people looking to measure poultry farm emissions who were not taking account of land use change in their... yeah in their in there And our exposure to that is both in the LCA and the calculator that all all of the values we create are including and excluding. We have to yeah both values, but I think yeah it makes sense to harmonise. I think... I think there's ah there' a really interesting debate um further up the chain when you get into, um you know, in integrator who have got deep connections with the with the animal feed um industry, you know, the the the global feed supply chains.
00:45:05
Speaker
And then you go further into into into the supermarket. Soy from minute one has been identified as being the source of the greatest opportunity to have a material impact on the carbon footprint.
00:45:19
Speaker
And one potential solution, if you want if you want to reduce the impact of your your your chicken or your egg, is to find a different source of ah protein eat either north american soy without the burden of that land use change or or you know something that we've grown closer to uh to home and the debate has been well is that the right thing to do or are we simply either paying to elect to make such a choice and and and actually globally we've made no difference because somebody else is still buying that raw material ah is the problem
00:45:51
Speaker
the crop itself or is it you know in a more a more political issue back where those those crops are being grown and and it's yeah you know to an extent i suppose personally just speaking personally um i it would not have surprised me to have seen our market in the uk run more quickly towards a ah set of soy-free products on on the shelf for that for that very simple reason that you could then label your product as being you know of of improved environmental impact but we haven't really.
00:46:27
Speaker
There's a few. You mentioned the shelf as it were. and one One of the questions I had and apologies if I'm kind of behind the curve on this and you can say they already are but do you think we're far away from a situation where chicken packaging could actually have the carbon footprint on it, you know, as a sort of, ah to really inform the consumer. And at that point, it's critical that the measurements are harmonized, otherwise you're comparing apples and oranges. i I can't claim to know the answer to to to to that. So i don't have any kind of inside inside knowledge. I am aware that there's been work on ongoing for
00:47:05
Speaker
at least a couple of years by, um why in conjunction with government agencies to to review exactly that. There's been an an enormous um kind of partnership across industry and up and down the supply chain sort of project to try to evaluate exactly what it would take to get to that point and i think probably from that that the harmonization word has become ever more important because you know if we've got x number of tools and we don't get the same out outcome when we put the same inputs into the calculator then how can we be sure we're comparing like we like it's difficult so maybe that's why that's been been put on hold there there are products on the shelf i haven't seen it i don't think i've seen it with chicken meat but certainly eggs that that are
00:47:49
Speaker
um you know low carbon and and and independently verified as being such. i think you know Morrisons have got a quite marked egg but um on the shelf. Again, I know egg base were involved in that, obviously. But yeah, how far away are we? I'm not sure because it's certainly my perception would be in the course of the last...
00:48:10
Speaker
um six, seven months, you know, there's been a slight shift in the dial as to where the environmental priorities yeah now, you know, now rank against some of the other issues that that are more like kind of economic defence, other issues facing the country. because they've been Do we know how the consumer feels about that and what the impact's been? Because I guess ultimately that's going to be what what drives how much interest there is doing that more broadly.
00:48:34
Speaker
Yeah. um Yeah, OK. So again, this would be chapter recording to Tom Willings only. i think I'd look at the success of those products that have been launched with with that USP being about the environment environmental impact. and i And I think I'd say on my little soapbox that um there hasn't been ah tremendous amount of commercial success. And if anything, um those products,
00:49:01
Speaker
um kind of pioneers if you like those that have been quick to launch products in the market um whether those products are 100% what they purport to be and I'm not saying they're not but they've been operating in a marketplace where um other products food and non-food have then been hauled over the coals for you know kind of questionable ethics about ah you know, greenwashing, carbon credit offsetting, et cetera, cetera, what's actually different?
Consumer Perception & Greenwashing Challenges
00:49:35
Speaker
You know, when you can when you can offset your flight, you know, across the Atlantic by just ticking this box on a website, you're still flying. Correct me if I'm wrong, but there's, you know, it's a bit difficult. So I think from a consumer point of view, I can ah can well understand, you know, kind of once bitten twice shy.
00:49:51
Speaker
You say it's good, but is it actually different? well There is consciousness from the regulators that they they they will have to regulate this. yeah They will have to standardise and regulate. But the task is enormous. It will come down that surely it doesn't all comes down to money. at the end of day there's ah There's a taxation process yeah here of ah of almost, yeah I suppose, our world, farming and and and and and agricultural development, like the polluter pays model. You create the risk, you better pay to clear it up kind of thing and that.
00:50:22
Speaker
But that requires measurement and that requires some enormous brains to work out financially how that can be sustained. ah i was just thinking from the consumer's perspective, I mean, you don't have to go back too many years for it to be highly unusual to see on ah on a menu at a restaurant or even a fast food outlet the calories. And yet we now as a consumer are very conditioned to seeing.
00:50:41
Speaker
And it strikes me as it's quite analogous, right? There needs to be a database of... what is 100 grams of chicken in terms of calories, what is 100 grams of chicken in terms of carbon? Of course, a lot of that science is is like 50 years old. yeah you know yeah but It's all calorie counting based on it combustible. yeah yeah Burn it in a petri dish and then work out how long it takes turn into charcoal. And there we go. That's how many. I have no idea. as I'm ably demonstrating. But it's ah pretty certain it's a very, very long in the tooth set are numbers that we still hang our hat on. i mean, if we look at the big things that the industry has measured over the years in terms of sustain other elements of sustainability, it's been significantly easier. For example, welfare, you know, pododermatitis, lameness. You can go in and measure those things. Although I still think that welfare has got a long way to go in terms of getting metrics, which are really, really... So pododermatitis is only really one aspect of welfare. There's many ways and in animal welfare can suffer, and I do think that... um
00:51:40
Speaker
it's one of the I think it's one of the harder areas to get really tangible metrics where we can say we've improved from X to Y. but Sorry, I kind of... Yeah, but but it has... Okay, let's have it yeah you know It has been measured. It has been measured. and and And for example, retailers have said, right, we want these metrics. You're mortality. We want this. We want that. We want that. absolutely And those are hard metrics that are relatively yeah easy to measure. yeah Same as antibiotic use, right?
00:52:06
Speaker
So antibiotic use... Very measurable. Milligram per kilogram. Yeah. but Prescriptions from veterinarians, measurable. But the carbon measurement is so complicated and therefore in invariably has such variability in it.
00:52:23
Speaker
It's different to those. Well, you're you're saying about welfare, it's more complex. I guess linking it back to welfare, it's complicated, but it's also what we end up with is much more comprehensive than I think welfare ah so I suppose there's pros and And science-based. Evidence-based, think getting three vets to try and discuss well. We had thirty different opinions here we we could we could be here we' you here for a while. It So fascinating topic we should we should we should look to wrap up so who wants who wants to give us sort of a final Elanco position, you know, you're doing you're doing extraordinary work for the industry, global industry, extraordinary work in supporting your customers as your customers look to, um you know,
00:53:05
Speaker
present their progress in terms of protecting the environment as well as feeding us you know safe nutritious value food tremendous job by the animal and in in terms of protecting its health and uh and improving productivity but you know how would you kind of summarize um all of your all of your work from a from a corporate position
00:53:30
Speaker
I'll have a go. I'm sure sure the others want to follow. But I mean, I i think I'd say festivals language coming at this kind of, I hope with some humility, I think if if this conversation is towards anything, it's what a journey we're on and how complicated this topic is. and But I think our goal is very much to be working with our customers, whatever sector they are in, and and I guess learning together. And i I think the point that I would make is that this isn't going away from our point of view. And I hope that people understand when they are choosing to partner with us and choosing to invest in us they can be confident that some of that is going back into into reinvesting in this area for the future so that hopefully we will be an organization who are a partner to progress really will be that you know probably slower than everybody would like because of the vast complexities in this area but yeah we we really hope to keep talking about this topic um with stakeholders from all over the industry really
00:54:22
Speaker
that sounds good from an it is an outside perspective now i think that uh um poultry or broiler customers can be confident that they are dealing with an institution that is committed to sustainability. Their own house is not completely in order but there's a huge effort to make sure their own house is in order.
00:54:43
Speaker
Plus to do the rigour to in ensure that they can tell the truth about the impact of their products on sustainability. The reason that customers buy them is for health and economics.
00:54:56
Speaker
But what is the truth about the impact of these products on this the sustainability of the operations? They can have confidence that Elanco will tell them that because of the investments have been made.
00:55:10
Speaker
Fantastic. George, anything you wanted to add? Well, I'm just debating on everyone to add. I don't know if i yeah if i if I build on anything that's already been said. I think picking up a little bit what Jackie would say, I think it's it's very tempting to to be wrapped up in everything we're doing in sustainability and and position ourselves as a significant...
00:55:27
Speaker
the the the the partner to provide all all all the solutions. i think I think it's important to have some humility. theres As I said earlier, I don't think there's one silver bullet or single thing that the industry is going to do to to reach all their targets, either in carbon footprint or in wider sustainability goals. But I think our commitment is that we are looking continuously and very rigorously at our existing portfolio to say, are there ways in which we can quantify and help our customers understand the value proposition in that and that sustainability space?
00:55:57
Speaker
And additionally, as Jackie's saying, we're reinvesting an awful lot into looking, are there products we haven't yet got or technologies that don't yet exist, which we could help develop and bring to the market, which will maybe be more specifically directly built to to improve sustainability? Now, let's be clear, the two products we've talked about today, Hemacell Maxiban,
00:56:15
Speaker
Neither of them were designed through a lens of sustainability. the The benefits we we are creating in sustainability are almost byproducts of of other things they do. But there may well be products in the future that we bring to the market, which are specifically bringing sustainability improvements to the customer rather than perhaps more the health-derived benefits that these products were created for.
00:56:36
Speaker
So i don't know if that helps or adds. I'd say that's a great place to leave it. I think i think you've all of you summarised very neatly what it's all about. So thank you for joining us, Jackie, George and George. um Pleasure to have you here.
00:56:52
Speaker
Very enjoyable um conversation. You've been listening to the Sustainability Hub podcast. Until next time, thank you.