Industry faces “significant” challenge.
Horse feed manufacturers can now measure their environmental impact across their product ranges.
The Carbon Calculator, developed by equine premix and supplement manufacturer Premier Nutrition, evaluates greenhouse gas emissions and the impact of land use change.
It has been designed specifically for the equine feed industry.
“It’s not the manufacturing but the raw materials that make it specific to the equine industry,” a spokesperson for Premier Nutrition told ETN.
“Each species uses a different set of raw materials, with some overlap, and the ones in the calculator are of course specific to equine.
“This gives equine feed manufacturers a precise tool which filters only the raw materials and countries of origin that apply to them and what they are producing.”
Carbon across typical horse’s diet
The scale of the [environmental] challenge the industry faces is significant, says Premier Nutrition.
Percentage split of carbon emissions in an example horse’s daily diet of 9kg forage, 2kg competition mix, 400g balancer, 1kg chaff and 100g of a supplement on a dry matter basis.
For example, the company calculates that an average 500kg adult horse being fed 70% forage and 30% compound feed - where the balancer and competition mix is using South American soya with LUC [land use change] - shows a highly uneven carbon distribution across its daily diet.
"The highest contributors tend to be mixes, cubes and balancers, predominantly due to the protein sources that can have high emissions, often due to the land use change applied to them,” Dr Kayleigh Manthorpe from Premier Nutrition explained.
"It demonstrates that where you're sourcing ingredients from becomes really important in terms of the emissions that are then associated with the final product.
“Using the tool, [manufacturer] customers can evaluate different ingredient formulations so they can make informed decisions to optimise health and performance, alongside the carbon footprint.”
