KARACHI: Chairman of Pakistan Poultry Association (PPA) Khalil Sattar denied the usage of hormones in chicken feed and said that chicken feed consisted of ingredients such as corn, broken rice, wheat bran, rice polishing, corn by-products, oil seed meals and vegetable oil. Dismissing the claims that poultry feed contained hormones, Khalil Sattar said that consumers often jumped to the conclusion that broilers were fed hormones based on the rapid weight gain in broilers. “If the producers really were feeding broilers hormones, the relevant food authorities would have lodged criminal cases against them and consumers would also have filed lawsuits worth billions of rupees against the suppliers of chicken,” said the PPA chairman. Khalil Sattar said that the weight gain in broilers in America was far greater than the weight gain in Pakistani produce. “Had the poultry industry in Pakistan been using hormones, there would have been a colossal import of hormones in the country duly reflected in the customs import figures,” he said. “After all, Pakistan is the 11th largest supplier of poultry in the world since it produces over 1.2 billion (bn) broilers annually,” he pointed out. “Chicken which was once considered a luxury has become the cheapest source of animal protein in the country,” said the PPA chairman. Khalil Sattar further said that he had not come across any publication showing any benefit of feeding hormones to the chickens. “Worldwide, there are only three major poultry genetic companies who are constantly doing research on improving the weight gain capacity and breeding chickens for desirable attributes including disease resistance and improved digestive tracts for better absorption of nutrients (to reduce feed cost),” he explained. He said that countries like US, Brazil and Argentina were producing chicken feed that had a higher energy content than the poultry feed in Pakistan. Sattar shared that this was possible because edible oils and feed grains were available in these countries at a low price. “There, a broiler chick gains more than 2 kg weight in 5 weeks while in Pakistan it takes about 6 weeks to gain the same weight,” explained Sattar. The PPA Chairman said that poultry genetic companies had research departments which were actively involved in nutritional research to support the genetic capacity of chickens. He added that these companies also had specialised departments to measure disease control capacity which was extremely necessary for producing the most economical package. “A critically balanced diet should be fed to chickens. This diet is formulated on a computer and it contains just the right balance of proteins and essential amino acids, such as Lysine, Methionine, Cysteine, Tryptophan, Isoleucine, Threonine, Valine and Arginine,” said Khalil Sattar. “And in the scope of nutrition, vitamins such as Vitamin A, B1, B2, B6, B12, D, E, K, Niacin, Biotin, Pantothenic Acid, Choline Chloride, etc and minerals such as Calcium, Phosphorous, Sodium, Potassium, Ferrous, Zinc, Copper, Manganese, Selenium, Cobalt, etc should be incorporated in chicken feed. a deficiency or an imbalance of any one of the nutrients would defeat achieving the optimum genetic potential,” said Khalil Sattar. “The research carried out by the Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science, University of Alberta, Canada has shown the evolution of growth in broiler production,” said the PPA chairman. “They have shown that in 1957, a day old chick weighed 34 grams, in 1978 it weighed 42 grams and in 2005, it weighed 44 grams. Likewise, at 28 days, broiler weighed 316 grams, 623 grams and 1396 grams in 1957, 1978 and 2005 respectively. 2005 onwards weigh gain in chicks has been increasing at the rate of 2 to 3% per annum,” explained Khalil. “Since there are only three major companies providing poultry genetic material, the chicken available in Pakistan is the same genetic package as the chicken available in the US, Europe, India, Brazil, Argentine, China, and elsewhere in the world,” said Khalil Sattar. Khalil said that most large producers in the Pakistan had modern state-of-the-art laboratories equipped with Elisa, Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) and necessary equipment for virus and bacterial isolation in order to evaluate the health status of chickens. “Regular tests are carried out according to a schedule to ensure that the chicken are free of viruses, bacterial contaminants particularly Salmonella, which is a transmittable bacteria injurious to human health and is extremely harmful for the chicken itself,” he added. Published in Daily Times, September 16th 2018.