The Efficacy of Microbial Phytase on Growth Performance, Phosphorus Utilization and Cost-benefit Analysis of Broiler Chicks

A four-week feeding trial was carried out to investigate the effect of exogenous phytase on growth performance, phosphorus utilization and cost analysis of broiler chicks. Five iso-nitrogenous and iso-caloric diets were compounded. The reference diet (diet containing both groundnut cake and soybean meal as plant protein and fish meal as animal protein source without phytase supplementation), diet 2 had groundnut cake based non-phytase diet, diet 3 had groundnut cake based phytase diet, diet 4 had soybean plant based non- phytase diet and diet 5 had soybean plant based phytase diet. 240 day-old broiler chicks were randomly assigned to the diets in a completely randomized design. Feed and water were provided ad-libitum . Each diet was allocated to 48 broiler chicks which were further divided into four replicates of 12 birds each. The feed intake, weight gain, feed conversion ratio and protein efficiency ratio of the birds were not significantly (p>0.05) influenced by the experimental diets. The final liveweight of birds on reference diet, diets 3and 5 (diets supplemented with phytase) however, higher (p<0.05) than the birds on phytase free diets. The phosphorus utilization of broiler chicks revealed a significant (p<0.05) increase in apparent phosphorus digestibility of birds on diets 3 and 5 at 74.68±2.31% and 72.73±2.55%, respectively over other plant protein based diets without phytase supplementation. The cost analysis of broiler chicks revealed that birds on phytase supplemented diet had a lower cost of feed per kg weight gain than the birds that were not phytase supplemented. Results show that phytase supplementation in broiler chicks diets had significantly favourable effects on growth parameters, enhanced utilization of feed which improved the nutrient digestibility of phosphorus and the cost per kg weight gain were highly reduced with phytase inclusion. Keywords : Broiler chicks, phytase, growth performance, phosphorus, cost analysis