Advances in Poultry Welfare with the Zinpro® Perfect Carcass® Tool 

Poultry is a key protein source for the world’s growing population. As consumers continue to rely on poultry protein, broiler welfare has become a top interest alongside dependable product quality. To better meet this consumer demand of poultry welfare visibility throughout the supply chain, we need to implement solutions that simultaneously support animal efficiency while elevating key indicators of bird wellbeing and meat quality.  

Challenges to Poultry Welfare

If unaddressed or undetected, these challenges lead to additional issues in poultry welfare and lower profitability throughout the supply chain. Broilers experiencing health issues or stress in the grow house will be less efficient and can yield a lower-quality product at the processing plant.  

To produce a high-caliber product, we need to monitor meat quality at the packing plant and make sure the correct welfare conditions are in place throughout the broiler’s life. It is not enough to identify a carcass lesion on the rail with cameras and sensors, we need to take a forensic approach to know why it occurred and pinpoint the specific moment in production that led to it.  

Discover the Zinpro® Perfect Carcass® Tool

Using a holistic view of broiler health and operational management, the Zinpro Perfect Carcass Tool provides practical insights to manage broiler welfare and improve animal wellbeing across the supply chain. With a scoring and benchmarking system, users can identify carcass lesions in their poultry flocks, evaluate the economic impact lesions cause within a poultry production operation and pinpoint the root causes of different lesion types. The Zinpro Perfect Carcass Tool provides insights to advance multiple areas of broiler production including: 

Welfare 

With the data collected at the plant, the Zinpro Perfect carcass tool can provide customized recommendations to reduce the incidence of lesions in a flock and advance poultry welfare and performance. Users will be able to identify logistics issues that are leading to increased lesion prevalence, such as:  

• Prolonged feed withdrawal periods 
• Dehydration or nutrition gaps 
• Transportation issues and heat stress 
• Inefficient or inadequate harvesting techniques 
• Traumatic points during processing 

Sustainability 

The power to pinpoint why lesions are occurring doesn’t only provide an actionable way to elevate and report on animal welfare, it also helps broiler sustainability. Decreasing the number of lesions results in fewer trimmings, downgrades and poultry carcass condemnations. 

Health and Nutrition 

Nutrition can have a significant impact on the final product and occurring lesions. By feeding Zinpro® Availa® Zn, poultry producers can improve skin integrity in broilers and reduce skin lesion incidences resulting in less condemnations and more marketable meat. When feeding Zinpro Availa Zn, the percentage of skin lesions decreased from 42.7% to 9.6% compared to broilers fed broilers fed inorganic zinc sulfate and the prevalence of cellulitis lesions was reduced from 52% to 40%.  

Partnering for Poultry Welfare 

The Zinpro Perfect Carcass Tool provides a clear picture of the connection between flock health pre-mortem and poultry carcass quality post-mortem. Partnering with customers, we have been able to take a forensic approach to identify production and processing challenges and why and where they happened. This information allows us to establish actionable items, improve processes and results and uncover more profit potential. The Zinpro Perfect Carcass Tool demonstrates that bird welfare can be ownable and supported at every step and provides opportunities to link and further communication between stakeholders across the poultry supply chain. 

• Sustainability and Welfare Executives in Poultry Integrators and Retail Businesses: to improve animal welfare and minimize carcass condemnations by collaborating in the understanding of the causes of lesions found in broiler carcasses and how to address them throughout the food chain. 
• Quality Managers: to monitor carcass quality at the facilities, as well as provide staff training. 
• Processing Plant Managers: to evaluate bottlenecks at the processing plants. 
• Financial Managers: to manage the overall economic impact of carcass lesions. 
• Operations Managers: to evaluate the solutions to lesions that may have their origin at the farms or during transport. 
• Veterinarians: to build a clear picture of the connection between live flock health and carcass quality. 
• Nutritionists: to gather data reports linking the use of performance to the use of Zinpro® Performance Minerals®. 
• Industry Consultants: to provide a unique value-added service rooted in knowledge and science. 

To learn more about the Zinpro Perfect Carcass Tool and implementing it into your poultry production system, connect with a Zinpro poultry team member. 

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