Global poultry production: Current impact and future outlook on the South African poultry industry

Poultry meat and eggs are the largest source of animal protein in the human diet worldwide. These are the benefits of decades of poultry research investments that were aimed at developing fast-growing strains, a better understanding of nutrient metabolism and utilization, and the effects of those nutrients on gene expression. The South African poultry industry has advanced alongside global trends in most developed countries. The industry is dominated by a few fully integrated large commercial producers, and a high volume of small-scale producers, either as contract growers or individual producers supplying solely the informal market. Currently, the poultry industry is battling to remain competitive, owing to tons of imported dark chicken meat being dumped in this market by other countries at prices below the cost of production locally. This has had negative consequences on producers, big and small, and on the employment rate. Disease outbreaks, welfare regulations, food safety, house environment and a number of issues relating to nutrition and feeding are among current and future challenges to the poultry industry, particularly the small-scale segment. With urbanization escalating, land availability and accessibility for intensive poultry rearing, and crop production for feed will be a challenge. Simultaneously, although poultry has the lowest carbon and water footprint, global warming is likely to affect feed quality and quantity, increasing feed and energy costs, thereby influencing food security. In future, maize and soybean meal on a worldwide basis will remain the major ingredients in poultry diets, although research on feedstuffs for partial replacement of these two will still be relevant, more so for home mixers. Focus on poultry science education and training, research and extension partnerships between poultry scientists and veterinarians also needs serious attention. Lack of collaboration between the private and public sectors, and lack of innovative ways to articulate concerns from producers and consumers to policy makers remain barriers to technological adoption. This review adopts poultry in sole reference to chickens.Keywords: Poultry science advances, meat, eggs, bird welfare, food safety, food security, sustainable productio

The NIEHS Environmental Health Sciences Data Resource Portal: Placing Advanced Technologies in Service to Vulnerable Communities

BACKGROUND: Two devastating hurricanes ripped across the Gulf Coast of the United States during 2005. The effects of Hurricane Katrina were especially severe: The human and environmental health impacts on New Orleans, Louisiana, and other Gulf Coast communities will be felt for decades to come. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) estimates that Katrina’s destruction disrupted the lives of roughly 650,000 Americans. Over 1,300 people died. The projected economic costs for recovery and reconstruction are likely to exceed $125 billion. OBJECTIVES: The NIEHS (National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences) Portal aims to provide decision makers with the data, information, and the tools they need to a) monitor human and environmental health impacts of disasters; b) assess and reduce human exposures to contaminants; and c) develop science-based remediation, rebuilding, and repopulation strategies. METHODS: The NIEHS Portal combines advances in geographic information systems (GIS), data mining/integration, and visualization technologies through new forms of grid-based (distributed, web-accessible) cyberinfrastructure. RESULTS: The scale and complexity of the problems presented by Hurricane Katrina made it evident that no stakeholder alone could tackle them and that there is a need for greater collaboration. The NIEHS Portal provides a collaboration-enabling, information-laden base necessary to respond to environmental health concerns in the Gulf Coast region while advancing integrative multidisciplinary research. CONCLUSIONS: The NIEHS Portal is poised to serve as a national resource to track environmental hazards following natural and man-made disasters, focus medical and environmental response and recovery resources in areas of greatest need, and function as a test bed for technologies that will help advance environmental health sciences research into the modern scientific and computing era

2009 Major Sponsored Programs and Faculty Awards for Research and Creative Activity

From discoveries in nanoscience, nutrigenomics and software engineering to innovative initiatives in math achievement, child welfare, water and climate change, UNL faculty are engaged in meeting the challenges of a changing world. This eighth annual “Major Sponsored Programs and Faculty Awards for Research and Creative Activity” booklet highlights the successes of University of Nebraska–Lincoln faculty during 2009. It lists the funding sources, projects and investigators on major grants and sponsored program awards received during the year; published books and scholarship; fellowships and other recognitions; start-ups and intellectual property licenses; and performances and exhibitions in the fine and performing arts. This impressive list grows each year and I am pleased to present evidence of our faculty’s accomplishments. Large grants in fields ranging from rural and math education to water and renewable energy to virology, redox biology and nanomaterials enable UNL faculty to address important challenges facing Nebraska, our nation and the world. Our external research funding reflects their achievements, reaching a new record total of $122 million in fiscal year 2009, marking a 13 percent increase over last year. We are harnessing this momentum to advance new initiatives with an innovative perspective and research that responds to a changing world. We are reaching beyond our institutional, state and national borders to build partnerships that seek solutions to global challenges, provide our students with an interdisciplinary, international perspective, and enhance our state’s economy. As you read the accomplishments in this booklet, I invite you to imagine how the innovative and collaborative research, scholarship and creative activity of our faculty is changing our world and meeting the complex global challenges that lie before us

IIHR Currents Winter 2011-12

https://ir.uiowa.edu/iihrcurrents/1005/thumbnail.jp