A recent test developed by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists in College Station, Texas, could make it easier to breed pathogen-resistant chickens.
The test identifies roosters whose blood contains naturally high levels of two key chemicals, cytokines and chemokines. These chemicals mobilize the birds’ innate immune response, according to ARS microbiologist Christi Swaggerty, in ARS’s Food and Feed Safety Research Unit.
Using the new test, commercial poultry breeders can single out roosters that have a strong immune response and use them to selectively breed a more robust flock. Such resistance, especially during the birds’ first week of life, may lower costs related to animal well-being and food safety.
Protecting chickens from pathogens involves sanitation, vaccination, biosecurity and use of antibiotics and other medications. But some chickens have an especially robust and efficient immune response and can resist pathogens, notes Swaggerty.
The researchers used the test to select roosters for breeding a line of resistant broilers. They then exposed the resistant broilers to several pathogens. They compared the resistant group to a group of susceptible broilers bred from roosters with low cytokine and chemokine levels.
The published results showed that the susceptible broilers had more pathogens and signs of infection than the resistant group. Ultimately, such resistance could mean fewer pathogens remaining on birds at the processing plant and improved consumer safety, Swaggerty notes.
Dr Swaggerty and her colleagues study the genetics of chickens’ resistance to foodborne disease-causing pathogens, such as Salmonella and Campylobacter. Some species of these two bacteria together cause 2 to 3 million US cases of foodborne illness in consumers and 450-500 deaths annually.
Another poultry disease, coccidiosis, is caused by a single-celled parasite known as Eimeria. In the US, coccidiosis inflicts annual production losses of up to $800 million, making this intestinal disease a significant threat to nearly 9 billion US meat-type birds.
Source : http://www.thepoultrysite.com/articles/3750/breeding-resistant-chickens-for-improved-food-safety/
PHILIPPINES – As the Philippine poultry sector recovers from the bird flu outbreak, Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol sees no urgent need to import chicken for the Christmas season.
“No. We have enough chicken supply,” Mr Piñol said in an interview in San Juan City on Thursday.
Mr Piñol said that he is in fact, discouraging imports because the country’s farmers are just now recovering.
GMA News Online reports the farm gate price of chicken in bird flu-hit Pampanga and Nueva Ecija has returned to P95 per kilo compared with P10 to P15 during the avian flu outbreak in August, the Cabinet official noted.
“They’re recovering now. In fact, the price of chicken is high again,” he said.
“Cobb has been growing market share in Asia Pacific substantially over the last three to four years, and we are on target in 2017 to become the breed of choice in the region,” he said.
“On top of the new facilities we’ve built in China and our plan to produce grandparents in New Zealand, we are also growing our sales and technical team. Our goal is to have a strong, highly skilled team of professionals who are an integral part of the Cobb family supporting our customers. We’re also launching an advertising campaign that highlights the expansion of our team in Asia.
“On the product side, we are introducing the CobbMV male which is expected to gain at least two points of feed conversion improvement,” he added. “The CobbMV male has previously demonstrated great performance in all climates with outstanding fertility and has also improved broiler livability. We are going to do a full launch at VIV Asia 2017 and we’re really excited”.
During the week, Roy Mutimer, regional vice president EMEA and Asia-Pacific,spoke about global developments for Cobb while technical experts Winfridus Bakker and Cody Polley shared their knowledge around breeder management with the team.
Cobb Asia is also introducing a Chick Improvement Plan to help key customers improve their breeder performance, taking advantage of the company’s worldwide expertise in breeder management.
Cobb-Vantress, Inc. is a poultry research and development company engaged in the production improvement and sale of broiler breeding stock. Cobb is the world’s oldest pedigree broiler breeding company. Founded in 1916, Cobb has grown into one of the world’s leading suppliers of broiler breeding stock with distribution into over 120 countries. Cobb has contributed to the dynamic efficiency and growth of an industry that has transformed chicken into an economically affordable healthy protein source for many of the over seven billion people in the world.
Source : http://www.thepoultrysite.com/poultrynews/38115/cobb-looking-ahead-to-accelerating-growth-in-asia/