Livestock Innovation

Coming events calendar

LRIC events

March 16: Join us for our second "Horizon Series" webinar as we talk about livestock and greenhouse gases with Dr. Claudia Wagner-Riddle, Professor in Environmental Sciences at the University of Guelph.

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April 9: What's holding up agricultural advisory services? The first in a three-part discussion series with local, national, and international experts in extension on how to turn agricultural research into on-farm action.

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April 21: Our third "Horizon Series" webinar will feature antimicrobial resistance with Jean Szkotnicki. Registration opening shortly!

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Industry events

March 30: Explore the Ontario Aquaculture Research Centre, Alma. Participants will hear from Prof. David Huyben, Department of Animal Biosciences, and RJ Taylor, co-owner of Cedar Crest Trout Farms.

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May 10 - 14: Animal Nutrition Conference of Canada. The theme of this virtual conference is Feeding the Future: Precision Nutrition for Tomorrow’s Animal.

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LRIC in the news

Milk Producer, March 2021: A better future together - how LRIC works for its members

Sector-specific

Poultry: Giving pullets room to thrive

University of Guelph researchers have found aviary design can impact lifelong hen. Both the strain of pullet and the style of aviary impact their locomotion and musculoskeletal characteristics. The project is part of the national poultry science cluster.

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Swine: Study leads to sow handling changes at Danish meat plant

A recent study from Aarhus University has led a Danish processing plant to make three key changes in how it handles sows going into the facility. These are: solid fencing on the ramp from truck to plant, a straight path forward, and a separate aisle for plant staff to stay away from the animals.

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Beef: Extending winter grazing with corn residue

Researchers at the University of Saskatchewan are exploring new ways to extend the winter grazing season by using what’s left after farmers harvest corn, while also studying cattle fed the harvested corn. The research will continue into 2022, but early results show the cows on the high-moisture corn residue maintained their body weight and their body condition score.

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Dairy: Keeping raw milk fresher, longer

Scientists at a university in Thailand have developed a system that uses UV light to keep raw milk fresh and reduce costs for small dairy farmers. Microorganisms can start growing in milk right away in tropical countries like Thailand, and refrigerators and chillers are expensive additions to the cost of milk production. The PASS+ system reduces microorganism levels by up to 90%, giving farmers up to two hours longer to get their milk to a collection centre.

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Small ruminants: Small tweaks can keep goat kids alive, study says

Minor management adjustments could reduce kid mortality in Ontario's dairy goat industry to single digits from its current level of 20 to 30%, suggests a new University of Guelph study. The three-year project focused on keeping detailed kid records that helped identify leading causes of death during each stage of life.

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Cross-sector

Cellular Meat: Innovation to bring down production costs

Canadian company Future Fields is developing a first-of-its-kind cellular growth medium that will dramatically reduce the cost of cell-based meat. The novel platform produces bioactive growth factors - the component that tells cells when and how to grow - at a large scale, enabling mass production of lab-grown meat.

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Feed: Reducing environmental impacts with precision feeding

Precision feeding of livestock like pigs can reduce the environmental impact of livestock farming, say researchers from Wageningen University in the Netherlands. Tailoring rations to individual animals or groups of animals improves digestibility and reduces the amount of unused minerals and nutrients in manure. The work was part of the European Union's Feed-a-Gene project that look at improving feed conversion of pigs, poultry and rabbits.

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Climate change: New collaboration for net zero climate goals

Aberystwyth University has entered into a long-term partnership with British forage and grassland seed company Germinal to promote sustainable farming. The focus will be on Aber High Sugar grasses that reduce emissions from livestock farms and new developments in lipid content of grasses, nutrient use efficiency and novel protein crops to achieve net zero carbon from ruminant livestock production.

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On the horizon

Climate change: The carbon crunch for agriculture

Tim Searchinger, senior research scholar at the Centre for Policy Research on Energy and the Environment at Princeton University, says solving the dilemma of drastically cutting emissions while substantially boosting yields requires a multi-part strategy:

Produce more food on the same land; protect forests and other habitat from being converted, reduce production emissions and demand for land and selectively restore areas where possible.

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Blockchains: A great opportunity disguised as a trend?

Transparency, permanence, and data sharing throughout the whole supply chain are the main benefits of blockchain technology, together with the speed in finding information about each product. In order for agrifood to take advantage of the full potential of blockchain, it needs to be integrated with other available technology, new research shows.

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Thanks for reading. We'd love to hear your feedback about LRIC - both about what we're doing and what you think we should be doing! Please contact us at info@livestockresearch.ca with any questions or comments.