Our top story last month was about the fact Cargill had made some changes at the executive level in its agriculture business. It announced that Joe Stone, enterprise leader for Cargill Animal Nutrition (CAN), would lead the company’s global agricultural supply chain operations and that David Webster would assume the CAN leadership role vacated by Stone.
Elanco Animal Health is looking to reduce the environmental impact of livestock production and increase nutrient digestibility through continued focus on improved health, enzymes, probiotics, and prebiotics.
Last month, we reported on how the company was aiming to grow its nutritional health portfolio. Moving forward as an independent, animal health focused company, Elanco, in what was the second most popular news story last month, said it is set to develop product lines for poultry and aquaculture while keeping its attention on the ruminant and swine sectors.
Mid-month, we covered the announcement from agribusiness giant, Cargill, that it had opened a new feed premix production facility in Jordan, which it termed one of the most technologically advanced premix plants in the world.
The Provimi Jordan factory will supply that market but also countries throughout the Middle East.
That story ranked third in our most popular articles from last month.
The story about the dismissal of the Kerrygold Butter class action lawsuit, first published in March, was still doing the rounds in April. You can read about the case here.
A feed processing story also featured highly in our most popular news last month. We had an insightful interview with a Trouw Nutrition lead on how best to manage moisture content in feed formulations.
He said moisture optimization in feed mills is critical as it can compensate for weight losses during feed processing, it can also preserve the shelf life of products and allow for uniform quality of finished feed.
The news that US grain trader and animal nutrition specialist, Archer Daniels Midland Company, would seek voluntary early retirements by some North American employees and may eliminate individual jobs as part of a restructuring of specific areas, garnered plenty of interest last month.
Coming in at number 7 on the hit list is the piece on Danish fish feed company, BioMar, and its investigation into a raft of innovative raw materials over the past few years. Following a thorough investigation of mealworm and BSF, last month it reported that, from its perspective, insect protein does offer promise but is not yet affordable as an alternative protein for use in fish feed formulations.
FeedNavigator got to tour Evonik's biotechnology R&D site in Germany in March. Our video report on the company's probiotic and gut health work got a lot of clicks.
A report on research last month looking at how the supplementation of farmed Nile tilapia feeds with peppermint essential oil may boost fish performance and survival following a disease challenge sparked a lot of interest.
A story about an Irish farming family commercializing a dried seaweed supplement that has enabled its pig herd to go antibiotic free, topped off our list of most popular news from April.
Seaweed production company, Sealac, launched a kelp supplement last month that was born out of pig farmer Martin Dempsey’s quest for materials that could reduce the use of antibiotics in the herd of 250 sows he looks after for the Costello Group.