Public Funding for Moy Park Limited

To develop a novel rapid consumer goods technology aimed at reducing bacteria growth, through use of anti-microbial additives, cutting-edge polymer components and modified atmosphere solutions to increase shelf life of chilled poultry products.

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Project Butterfly brings together a consortium of UK high value and fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) organisations working across sectors, along with solution providers and research organisations to share best practice and demonstrate the power of I4.0 to deliver near-term impact on the road to net zero manufacturing. The climate emergency is an important challenge we all face but we cannot wait for new low carbon technology to start transforming our factories. Project Butterfly takes urgent action through cross sectoral collaboration, enabling common problems to be optimally resolved. Developing digital processes with data centric technologies, Project Butterfly aims to significantly reduce industrial waste and improve energy efficiency, making an meaningful environmental impact on the manufacture and processing of the products we use, or consume every day. Small changes can have a big impact, this is known as the butterfly effect. It's this principle that Project Butterfly looks to use to accelerate progress to Net Zero. The Project has a specific focus on improving efficiency in the use of materials and energy by using manufacturing data to optimise processes, increase right first time yield (FTY) and provide visibility of information to everyone in the factory. This can be done by using data to automatically update the schedule to deliver the most efficient use of energy. Using data from the process to improve the process by making it more efficient or increase the right first time yield. As we focus on designing new greener consumer products, Project Butterfly ensures the manufacturing methods are also as environmentally respectful. So whether it's the car you drive to work, the food on your table or the airplane that connects you to the world, it's not only a sustainable product, but it has also been manufactured in a sustainable way.

The annual value of UK agriculture to the national economy is in the region of £122 billion (2018, DEFRA). The value of the UK poultry meat production sector alone, the second largest in Europe, to the UK economy increased by ~ 9% to £2.6billion (2018) with 1.24 billion birds producing in the region of 1.8 million tonnes of meat. This is a sector seeing continued expansion to meet retail demand where production was boosted by ~6% in 2018, the highest rate of any meat production sector (DEFRA, 2020). Such intensification has however to be balanced against the need for high levels of animal welfare and environmental protection, particularly when considered against national and international climate change targets. Globally the poultry meat production sector is responsible for 8% of agriculture emissions at ~ 100 CO2-eq/kg of protein produced. Against this backdrop mitigation methods such as animal health interventions and farm infrastructure/management improvements will be key for sustainable productivity increase (FAO, 2018). Moy Park is one of the largest poultry integrators in the UK, with over 45 million birds housed at any one time. This equates to 2,396 houses across England and Northern Ireland. A poultry house, with a life span of over 30 years, presents a significant capital investment for any farmer. Additionally, due to the nature of poultry production these houses have a significant demand for energy to control and provide heating, ventilation, lighting and operate feeding systems. The cost of building these houses, along with their running costs accounts for 33% of growing a chicken. Therefore, from an industry perspective, to help achieve the net zero emission by 2040 in a sustainable manner that assures high animal welfare practices, work must start now. The _Ideal Home_ partnership, led by Moy Park Ltd., has developed a feasibility project that introduces a detailed baseline assessment identifying the current situation within "traditional" housing. Ideates and evaluates precision solutions for alternative housing systems to produce feasible, sustainable new approaches to poultry housing and management for improved well-being and performance, energy efficiency and improved resource efficiency. _Ideal Home_ is an exciting project with high reward potential as it seeks to spur transformational change to sustainability and productivity across the UK's poultry production system. Net zero emission agriculture, tuned to feed the growing global population, can only succeed if improved production and sustainability are fully integrated into the food production process.

There is increasing concern around the sustainability of the UK poultry feed supply chain, with a growing industry trend of moving away from soy as well as enhancing overall bird health & welfare. Insects have been demonstrated to be an excellent nutritional alternative, and are already a natural part of free-range poultry diets in the UK today. But insects cannot be cheaply and safely produced, stored and distributed as a commercial feed using existing engineering solutions and logistics infrastructure. Entomics' innovation enables insects to become a nutritious, sustainable feed ingredient for the UK poultry market, using a smart, modular insect production system. Overall, the project will expedite and de-risk system development, bringing it closer to commercial readiness whilst consolidating Entomics' position as an engineering leader in a global insect industry growing at 102.5% CAGR.

This project will investigate the ability to reduce levels of fat content in products that are currently fried without inhibiting quality and taste. This project will investigate the ability to produce a product with lower calorie content. The project partners will work together to ensure that project is in line with the macro health trend of the food market. The project specifically focuses on the high level challenge of reducing the levels of saturated fat and total fat. The aim of the project is improve products which ordinarily have rather high calorie content, whilst calorie content is improved. It is essential that the products remain appealing and that their consumer appeal will increase, in order to make the products commercially viable. This will be achieved through analysis of the current landscape, kitchen, pilot and factory trials and market research to gauge consumer reaction. This project will deliver a first to market solution to give the leading edge, whilst attributing to a global first in this area of the food market.

Camplylobacter is one of the most serious food borne pathogens, infecting over 280,000 people, and costing the UK economy £580m p.a. In this study, we will conduct the largest known molecular study to track and trace Campylobacter through the supply chain. We will deploy whole genome sequencing on a massive scale to optimise a series of on farm and factory interventions that reduce the contamination of whole chickens with Campylobacter. These interventions include novel animal feeds and factory processes. We will also develop a new qPCR testing kit for Campylobacter. This will be deployed and validated on farm and in factories. The kit will be developed to segregate live from dead cells. It will provide the industry with a real time and accurate rapid enumeration technique.

To develop risk management model to determine rank hazards related to ingredients followed by development and implementation of testing regime related to the hazards

Campylobacter is the most common cause of food borne-illness in the UK. An EU baseline study estimated prevelance in broilers of 75 percent and in boiler carcasses of 86 percent (ESFA, 2011). It is responsible for over 80 deaths p.a. in the UK, over 65 percent of which is derived from campylobacter infected chicken (FSA, 2011). This project will develop two main intervention strategies on the farmand slaughterhouse to reduce the burden of Campylobacter in the UK poultry industry. This is particularly timely due to the recent targets released by the FSA to reduce the proportion of high contaminated carcasses from 27 to 10 percent by 2015. The strategies are based on dietary supplements aimed at reducing Campylobacter survival in the gut (novel anti-microbials); and deployment of novel screening technologies to increase contamination detection on cracasses in the slaughterhouse (flourescent faecal markers).

PROJECT TITLE: Improving the availability of UK sourced protein feed through new faba bean varieties, production and utilisation systems Summary: The shortfall in sustainable protein produced in the UK and the EU creates an opportunity to evaluate and improve an established crop with previously untapped potential. The high protein content and acceptability of faba beans by some, but not all, of the feed industry offers the opportunity of market expansion for home produced legumes through advanced feeding trials. Faba beans are self sufficient in nitrogen and leave residual N for following crops, so contributing to environmental sustainability. However, the yield potential, and thus protein yield, of faba beans is seldom maximised. This project will establish the effects of advanced agronomy on faba bean output, and address the issue of yield stability by genetic selection and improved breeding processes to generate new varieties of faba bean optimised for feed markets

The project aims to convert waste product from seafood processing into valuable materials for novel industrial applications. The Consortium researches on the development of worldwide-sourced and UK-manufactured high performance functional materials for use in the food, agricultural and drilling sectors by processing chitosan, a biopolymer from crustacean waste. A novel low environmental impact process for obtaining chitosan and a range of functional materials based on derivatisation of the biopolymer is being developed. The demographic trend towards smaller households in the UK means that there is rapid growth in packaging that offers fresh food in a consumer-ready state. Increasing safety and shelf-life of highly perishable food is very important for producers and consumers and presents a major business opportunity, that is addressed in this project. The agricultural applications of the functional material demonstrate clear technical advantages over competing materials, because it allows the reduction of chemical and irrigation inputs. The project is funded by the Technology Strategy Board and the Consortium brings together leading companies in polymer, food, agricultural and drilling industries along with academic institutions with the aim to modify the processing of crustacean shells (using existing waste) and provide a range of new bio-based materials.