The reliance on marine-based ingredients has been problematic for the aquaculture feed industry for many years. The industry still has some ways to go in producing a fish meal-free diet across all species, but R&D developments in this area have highlighted that fish do not require fishmeal to grow and perform optimally. The only requirements are:
• Essential nutrients, such as digestible protein, fat for energy, vitamins and minerals
• Palatable compound feed
• Good water quality
By defining alternatives that meet these requirements, those ingredients are no longer alternatives; they are equivalent – and often superior – sources of nutrition. Plant-based protein sources are still the number-one preferred alternative for replacing fishmeal in aquaculture feeds. The high inclusion of plant-based ingredients in connection with the challenges associated with climate change are expected to bring a higher level of mycotoxin contamination to aquaculture. To act both early and effectively, it is very important to understand the risk level for individual species and specific raw materials, as this is the basis of a strong quality-control programme.
A Three-pillar Approach to Quality Control
A strong quality control programme is the foundation for establishing effective mycotoxin management at the feed mill. A quality control programme helps ensure that all raw materials entering the facility are quality-tested based on several factors and strategies in place, including storage, processing and finished feed storage.
At specialist feed mill Alltech Coppens Germany, the establishment of a mycotoxin management programme was the result of doctoral research carried out by Vivi Koletsi at the Alltech Coppens Aqua Centre. The initial phase of this project was to assess the risk, and data was collated from the Alltech 37+® laboratory (from 2012 to 2019) comprised of wheat corn and soybean meal and complete fish feeds. A raw material analysis highlighted that more than 80% of the wheat samples, 95% of corn and 87% of soybean returned positive mycotoxin results, 43 individual toxins were detected in wheat and corn and 34 in soybean meal. The analysis of fish feed samples found that DON was the toxin that appeared the most in terms of both occurrence and toxicity.
The second stage of this project led to a meta-analysis completed by Koletsi et al. (2021) to demonstrate the risk of DON on feed intake and growth performance. Simultaneously, data was collected to quantify the risk of exposure in fish. The extent to which DON affects feed intake and growth performance was evaluated by employing a meta-analytical approach.
Alltech Coppens uses a three-pillar approach to manage the mycotoxin risk. These three pillars are brought together in feed formulation software to analyse and calculate the risk associated with each feed that is being manufactured, with the appropriate practices in place to mitigate the associated risk.
