Summit discusses phytase friend or foe

Presentations at the summit covered whether phytate should be considered the enemy, how to deal with phytate, and finally how to destroy phytate, including an evaluation of phytase ‘superdosing’.

Commenting on the event, Dr. Hadden Graham, AB Vista’s Technical Director, said: “IPS 2 built on and exceeded the success of the first IPS event in 2010. There was an interesting blend of papers on a diverse but inter-related series of topics, from plant breeding through human nutrition to formulating animal feeds with phytase. The major focus of the summit was on the anti-nutritional effects of phytate, and the subsequent benefits in animal performance of destroying phytate through the use of highly effective phytases. I was particularly impressed by the cost-saving opportunities from high-performance phytases as highlighted by several speakers; across the swine and poultry compound feed industry these could be worth up to €6 billion feed cost savings from the nutritional value of phytase plus €3 billion from better animal performance due to superdosing.”

The summit, 11-13 December, was hosted by Schothorst Feed Research, NL, Massey University, NZ, University of Maryland, USA, University of Sydney, Australia and AB Vista