New Enzyme Treatment May Produce More Nutrition from Canola Meal

A new multi-enzyme treatment may produce a higher nutritional benefit from canola meal, making it more competitive with soybean meal, while other treatments are being developed to possibly reduce its fiber content, according to researchers at the University of Manitoba.

Bogdan Slominski, professor of animal science at the university, explains that using a multi-enzyme treatment has been found to unlock an additional 100 to 150 kcal/kg of metabolizing energy from canola meal.

‘The end goal of our research is to minimize the variability in the nutritive value of canola meal due to processing conditions and to increase the inclusion level of this valuable protein supplement in monogastric animal diets,” Slominski told FeedNavigator.

In addition, canola has a higher fiber content than soybean meal with total fiber content of about 38%, which adds little benefit to nutrient use and can be difficult to digest. Research is also being conducted regarding methods of reducing this fiber content in canola meal through low-fiber seeds and tail-end de-hulling.

The next step for the research team is to survey the products from the 11 different canola crushing plants across Canada to find variabilities in the finished canola meal caused by different processing conditions. Once existing variabilities are determined, the team plans to explore methods that can be employed to reduce the variability of the product with the goal of increasing the use of canola meal in animal feed diets.