Page 8 - National Poultry Newspaper

Environmental measurements and impact of chicken production
Solar calculator helps Aussie egg farmers
THE egg industry is al- ready one of the most sustainable agricultural sectors in Australia, but Australian Eggs is on a mission to continue to drive farmers towards carbon neutrality by delivering research and tools that will enable farmers to take steps towards a sustainable future.
tor works by identify- ing farmer options and guides consideration, as well as accelerating the adoption of renew- able energy in the egg industry.
their energy costs and improve environmental outcomes.
Considering ways to help the industry be- come more sustainable, Australian Eggs saw an opportunity to help small to medium egg farms, which don’t have the resources to investi- gate and analyse the vi- ability of solar energy.
Solar energy works well for the egg indus- try as energy production mirrors the energy load from cooling systems across the day.
“Research tells us the community is interested in environmental issues and how agricultural in- dustries are going to low- er the carbon footprint.
This prompted the de- velopment the solar cal- culator tool.
In response to electric- ity costs increasing over the past decade, some larger egg farms have already successfully im- plemented large scale so- lar projects to both lower
“We've developed a solar calculator to allow egg farmers to see how solar could work on their farm, and how much they could reduce their power bill.
The solar calcula-
“Egg producers who have installed solar pan- els are noticing the dif- ference.”
Egg farming uses a significant amount of electricity as air-condi- tioned sheds are required to ensure hens are safe from Australia’s harsh climate.
Australian Eggs man- aging director Rowan McMonnies said, “Ten of the country's 12 larg- est egg producers have some form of solar en- ergy powering their farms.”
Egg production already has the lowest carbon footprint of common an- imal protein sources and is comparable to some plant-based foods.
Rowan McMonnies said 10 of the country's 12 largest egg producers have some form of solar energy powering their farms.
For more information about the solar calculator, visit australianeggs. org.au/for-farmers/ tools-and-training/solar- calculator
With the uptake of so- lar on egg farms, the in- dustry is now even closer to achieving carbon neu- trality.
THE Australian Chick- en Meat Federation ap- proached a number of experts to provide com- mentary about issues re- lating to the industry.
This may seem counter- intuitive to some, however by consuming less re- sources – for example less grain to produce chicken meat – and using less en- ergy over time, the im- pacts are actually reduced for every unit of produced product.
Integrity Ag and Envi- ronment managing direc- tor and principal scientist Dr Stephen Wiedemann addresses the subject of the environmental im- pacts of chicken produc- tion, explaining the con- cept of lifecycle assess- ment and environmental footprint.
So even though the in- dustry is intensive, this can be an upside when it comes to environmental performance.
Environmental impacts and measurements
Another area where the poultry industry is reduc- ing the environmental burden is waste.
When considering en- vironmental impacts for a production system such as chicken meat, while a fairly broad topic, the main components gener- ally looked at are:
was done using a ‘life- cycle assessment’ tool – more common terms such as ‘carbon footprinting’ or ‘water footprinting’ may be recognised – to assess the total impacts of every kilogram of chicken meat that makes it to the retail shelf in Australia.
is obviously very impor- tant to poultry. Environmental impacts of modern chicken pro- duction
The industry hardly talks about this nowadays because the main waste product coming out of the system is spent litter, and the sector has done a lot of work to improve the utilisation of this product by other agricultural in- dustries.
• Greenhouse gas emis- sions
• Resource use – water and energy
There may be a percep- tion that because the poul- try sector is quite inten- sive that the impacts from chicken meat production therefore would be high.
In effect the industry has turned a waste product into a valuable resource – a very effective program with spent litter from poultry now in demand by the dairy industry and horticultural sector.
• Nutrient loss and its effect – principally from manure and the way it is managed and handled.
The findings from this research demonstrate the impacts of producing chicken meat are very low, consistent with the results of several studies under- taken overseas and testa- ment to the efficiency of the Australian production system.
The best approach to assess these impacts is to consider the full sup- ply chain – not only the poultry house where the chickens are raised, but also processing and grain production.
Interestingly, it is quite the reverse.
By looking at the full supply chain, we gain a more accurate picture of the total impacts for every kilogram of chicken meat that is produced.
Key advantages Aus- tralia enjoys include rela- tively low environmental impacts from the grain production system, which
Over many years, im- provements have been made in the production efficiency of the poultry industry, which translates to lower environmental impacts.
The result being that the nutrients excreted by the birds are being utilised by the agricultural industry for crop and pasture pro- duction.
Research in this area
As the poultry industry is intensive, farmers are able to more closely man- age both their impacts and emissions.
The majority of the waste product is compost- ed or applied directly to land as a fertiliser replace- ment.
Waste and utilising it
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visit crop-solutions.basf.com.au or contact your local CCD Representative on 1300 791 009
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Page 8 – National Poultry Newspaper, November 2021
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