Reducing the incidence of foodborne illness attributed to eating chicken has been on ongoing challenge for the industry and the source of regulatory concern. “Right now, there’s not a lot of companies tracking serotypes very vigorously, but I think that the new regulations are going to drive folks to start looking at serotypes a lot harder,” said Don Ritter, DVM, owner, Poultry Business Solutions LLC. Ritter will discuss how emerging technologies may be harnessed to improve health and food safety outcomes for both broilers and humans at the 2024 Chicken Marketing Summit. Registration is ..read more

Consumer price increases remained high last month, boosted by gas, rents, and car insurance, the government said Wednesday in a report that will likely give pause to the Federal Reserve as it weighs when and by how much to cut interest rates this year. Prices outside the volatile food and energy categories rose 0.4 percent from February to March, the same accelerated pace as in the previous month. Measured from a year earlier, these core prices were up 3.8 percent, unchanged from the year-over-year rise in February. The Fed closely tracks core prices because they tend to provide a good read o ..read more

The National Veterinary Services Laboratory (NVSL) detected highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) for the first time in a dairy herd in North Carolina on April 10. “This is an evolving situation, and we are waiting for more diagnostics from NVSL and will work collaboratively with our federal partners and dairy farmers in North Carolina,” said Steve Troxler, North Carolina commissioner of agriculture. “We have spent years developing methods to handle HPAI in poultry, but this is new, and we are working with our state and federal partners to develop protocols to handle this situation. It is ..read more

Since 2022, avian flu — a rapidly circulating Influenza Type A virus — has affected more than 81 million poultry, as well as the industries that depend on them. In Alabama alone, poultry generates more than 80,000 jobs and $15 billion in revenue.In the past two years, a disease-causing strain of avian flu, known as H5N1, has impacted 1,046 flocks across the United States. Miria Criado, an assistant professor in Auburn’s College of Veterinary Medicine, is tackling this timely topic by investigating how these influenza viruses evolve and examining approaches to reducing their deadly impact on p ..read more

Since the H5N1 virus was first detected in Canada in December 2021 and has since spread to poultry flocks throughout America, people have commonly referred to this virus as highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI). However, Kay Russo, DVM, MAHM, DACPV, believes now that the virus has appeared in dairy cattle in the United States, people need to be more intentional with what they call it. Russo explained why on April 5, while speaking during the webinar, “Managing Novel Disease Introduction and Biosecuity Practices to Protect Herd Health.” “In my opinion, the disease in cattle at this poi ..read more

The highly lethal form of avian influenza circulating the globe since 2021 has killed tens of millions of birds, forced poultry farmers in the United States to slaughter entire flocks and prompted a brief but alarming spike in the price of eggs. Most recently, it has infected dairy cows in several states and at least one person in Texas who had close contact with the animals, officials said this week. The outbreak, it turns out, is proving to be especially costly for American taxpayers. Last year, the Department of Agriculture paid poultry producers more than half a billion dollars for the tu ..read more

New data shows a correlation between darkling beetle populations and Salmonella loads in poultry houses, highlighting the importance of pest control in pre-harvest food safety. “The industry really understands that insects are reservoirs for certain types of diseases. But I think what really hasn’t been clear is how much do they impact that end result,’ Dr. Alissa Welsher, senior monogastric technical consultant, Elanco, said. “This is one of those things where we know they’re there and we know that they harbor Salmonella, but we didn’t know to what degree.” There is intense pressur ..read more

The move to cage-free egg production in the US and Europe created a seismic change in hen breeding programs. Besides traditional performance factors such as feed-conversion ratios, breeders now must consider traits that help hens withstand the rigors of living in large, complex aviary systems with thousands of other birds. “To be successful in cage-free housing systems, hens must know how to get along with their fellow flock members…and take better care of themselves compared to hens in conventional cage systems,” reported Teun van de Braak, global technical service manager, Hendrix Genetics ..read more

True Organic Products, Inc. is excited to join the California Poultry Federation and proud to be an industry partner. Founded in 2003 and family owned and operated True has been working in the poultry industry for over two decades. We specialize in adding value to poultry by-products such as manure and rendered materials. Our primary manufacturing facility is located in Helm, CA and we service the valley with a fleet of over 30 trucks. For more information please reach out to: Johnny Peck Senior VP Sales True Organic Products, Inc. (559)281-8596 jpeck@true.ag ..read more

Formulating and manufacturing animal feed requires vast amounts of data, the sort of task artificial intelligence (AI) was created to feast upon and digest into usable information that could address universally shared challenges within the feed industry, such as quality and efficiency. AI supporters herald a new era of data application that draws on exponential computational speeds linked with humanlike thought processes to produce original outcomes. The feed industry operates in a space of tight profit margins challenged by a desire for improved quality, energy efficiency, sustainability and ..read more