Abstract
Use of Genetically Modified Feedstuffs in Poultry Nutrition
The rapid increase in the World population causes increase in animal protein requirements of the people. Poultry products including poultry meat and egg have important role in supplying the animal protein requirement. However, increase in the production of feedstuffs used in poultry nutrition is less than the increase of the World population. In order to overcome this problem, the use of agricultural biotechnology in feed production has been increasing year by year. As a result, genetically modified feedstuffs have received more interest over the last few years. These products are produced in developed countries and exported to the developing and undeveloped countries. Turkey also imports the genetically modified feedstuffs for production and multiplication. Despite the public concerns on the safety of these stuffs for human and animal health and the environment, production of genetically modified varieties in Europe continue to increase. This can create serious problems in the future for poultry industry in countries dependent on imported feedstuffs. Therefore, more feeding studies on the genetically modified feedstuffs and crops with various poultry species in order to determine the positive and negative effects on the health of consumers, poultry and also on the environment are needed. In this paper, feeding studies made on the genetically modified feedstuffs used in nutrition of various poultry species have been reviewed.
Keywords
Genetically modified feedstuffs, poultry, gene transfer