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Current livestock farming practices differ significantly from natural conditions, affecting how piglets and chicks develop and adapt to their environments. In nature, piglets remain with their mothers and nurse for extended periods before gradually transitioning to solid feed, allowing their digestive systems to mature slowly. Similarly, chicks benefit from a prolonged relationship with their mother, picking up beneficial bacteria from her feathers, droppings, and the environment she introduces them to, which helps establish a healthy gut microbiota. A balanced microbiota plays a crucial role in nutrient digestion and pathogen defense, strengthening the chicks’ immune systems and supporting digestive health. However, modern farming necessitates weaning and feeding animals earlier than in natural settings, often before their digestive systems are fully prepared to handle solid food. This early weaning can challenge the digestive health of both piglets and chicks. Unlike their wild counterparts, farm animals face solid feed and environmental exposure to pathogens at a time when their stomachs and intestines are still underdeveloped. The lack of a gradual transition to solid food can stress their digestive systems, affecting their ability to process nutrients efficiently, which has implications for their growth and health. One of nature’s primary defense mechanisms against pathogens is the acidification of the stomach. This natural process creates a hostile environment for harmful bacteria, limiting their growth and reducing the risk of infections. Stomach acidity plays a vital role in killing or reducing bacteria before they can enter further into the digestive tract. However, when weaning occurs prematurely, the immature digestive systems in piglets and chicks may not yet produce adequate levels of stomach acid, increasing their vulnerability to bacterial overgrowth and associated health risks. Research Insights on Digestive Challenges During Weaning Recent research highlights the unique challenges faced by piglets during weaning. In a study led by Henza

This month, I would like to share an interesting tool aiming at monitoring formulation performance. We are touching a very critical topic that dictates the competitive game between feed millers. It is about which company will formulate the best feed at the cheapest cost. It requires a lot of intelligence, time and energy to build set of feed formulas and we need to be sure that not only they are performing better than the competition but that we are actually getting better every month. I am sure that you will be interested in the following article. The job of nutritionist changed a lot in the past years. Nutritionist does not prepare formulas anymore. They are responsible for defining the constraints that will enable optimization software to select the cheapest option. The formulation perimeter is the space allowed to the software between 4 distinct sets of constraints; nutritional requirement, non-nutritional requirement, raw material composition and raw material prices. The mission of nutritionist is to adjust this formulation perimeter (by increasing or decreasing the constraints) to optimize the feed performance (FCR, feed cost, growth, mortality, feed intake, etc…). The difficulty of this process lies in the fact that raw material prices are constantly changing, thus, obliging the software to modify the formulas. Therefore, we cannot compare the performance of formulas made with today’s prices with the ones made yesterday. The economical context varies and makes internal benchmarks difficult over time. FORMULATION PERFORMANCE INDEX The tool that we propose is called FPI for Formulation Performance Index. It is used to monitor the improvement of the formulation skills during a period of time. During the year, formulation will change due to: As we are trying to evaluate if the changes of the perimeter done by the formulator are having a positive impact on the