Improving soybean meal protein in pig and poultry diets may reduce lifecycle GHGs by more than 4.6%.
FieldRise and Blue Spring Ecosystem scientists and livestock nutritionists have discovered that improving soybean meal protein can reduce lifecycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and improves farm-sector revenue at no added cost to farmers. The team found that improving soybean meal protein in pig and poultry diets automatically reduces lifecycle GHGs more than 4.6%.
The breakthrough happened when agronomists and nutritionists joined to combine data on soybean variety-level feed value, corn demand, and carbon intensity. In addition to discovering the emissions reduction, they found that improving soybean meal protein can boost corn demand beyond 13.8% in broiler diets and 5.2% in pig diets. Improved demand for natural feed would increase overall revenue for crop farmers, who typically grow soybeans and corn in rotation. Soybeans with high nutrient levels also may help livestock producers reduce feed costs, while simultaneously cutting GHGs and energy use.
A 2020 Argonne Lab study found that production of natural corn and soybeans causes less GHG than DDGS and synthetic amino acids. It also found that natural feed produces significantly less emissions than other feed ingredients that compete with corn and soybeans for share of the livestock diet.
Argonne National Laboratory found that natural feed produces significantly less emissions than other feed ingredients that compete with corn and soybeans for share of the livestock diet.
The discovery that improving soybean protein helps reduce emissions and increase corn demand gives farmers new reasons to intensify their fight to reverse decades of declining soybean protein, say those involved. Most farmers, they add, are unaware that they are losing hundreds of millions of dollars in soybean sales every year to non-natural feed ingredients.
U.S. soybean protein levels continued declining last year because most seed companies do not breed for protein. Most farmers are unaware that nutritional quality can be controlled through seed selection. This trend causes concern for livestock nutritionists who count on soybeans for high-quality protein.
Peer-reviewed data analysis from thousands of soybean samples in 2017 found billions of dollars in potential farm-sector value and livestock feed-cost and oil value differences hiding at the variety level. Picking a soybean variety is routine. It costs farmers nothing to select seed varieties that delivers higher nutrient levels, and the potential industry payoff is significant, according to the independent science review.
“The data clearly show farm revenue and food sustainability can improve when farmers select soybeans with superior nutritional quality,” according to John Osthus, co-founder of Blue Spring Ecosystem Services and a partner in FieldRise, an independent farm and consumer sustainability practice measurement company. “Selecting soybean seed based on nutritional quality helps make natural feed more attractive for livestock nutritionists than greenhouse-gas-intensive synthetic feed. The findings fit neatly with the ‘integrated system’ view that USDA uses to define farm sustainability.”
Most companies have declined to improve soybean protein because they are paid for yield, not quality. AgReliant (AgriGold, LG Seeds) and Syngenta were among the first seed companies to announce plans to improve soybean nutrition and oil value.
AgReliant specialty products manager Chuck Hill said, “As a seed company we focus on bringing value to our growers through the products we sell and the services we offer. AgReliant embraces the opportunity to bring more value to growers through higher livestock feed value, increased corn and soybean demand, and improved sustainability. This is a win-win for all involved including the consumer of the finished product.” Dr. R. Dean Boyd, nutrition research scientist and adjunct professor in animal nutrition at North Carolina State and Iowa State Universities helped the FieldRise team watch the corn amount increase by using higher nutrient value soybean meal, literally one line up in the software that many livestock nutritionists use to formulate feed.
“When soybean meal protein improves, less is needed, but the feed value goes up to replace lost volume. Corn replaces the soybeans and space normally filled by soybean protein alternatives and overall farm revenue increases. In pigs and poultry, the potential corn demand increases and emissions intensity drops.”
“When soybean meal protein improves, less is needed, but the feed value goes up to replace lost volume,” Boyd points out. “Corn replaces the soybeans and space normally filled by soybean protein alternatives and overall farm revenue increases. In pigs and poultry, the potential corn demand increases and emissions intensity drops.”
University of Wisconsin soybean agronomist and FieldRise founding partner Dr. Shawn Conley said corn demand being directly tied to soybean quality was missed before because agriculture is organized as separate crops. Seeing the “ecosystem view” makes common ground easier to find because most farmers who grow soybeans also grow corn, he said.
“Looking at the marketplace as a network instead as separate crops makes sense with livestock feed because corn and soybeans comprise most of the livestock diets,” Standard Nutrition Company Nutrition Director Dr. Bart Borg explained. “With the finding that feed contributes up to 90 percent of livestock greenhouse gas emissions, corn and soybean farmers who select the best quality feed improve their own revenue and automatically help their customers like me meet their livestock profit and sustainability goals.”
Click image to view our Feedstuffs 365 panel discussion on this topic.
