Productive performance of commercial growing and finishing pigs supplemented with a phytase as a total replacement of inorganic phosphate.

The objective of this study was to test if a novel phytase from sp. can replace all added inorganic phosphate in a diet with reduced Ca and metabolizable energy (ME) fed to commercial pigs from 12 kg body weight (BW) until slaughter, whilst maintaining performance and carcass quality parameters. Four dietary treatments were tested in a completely randomized design with 9 replicate pens, each containing 31 mixed sex Newsham Choice pigs. Diets included a positive control (PC) based on corn, soybean meal, wheat middling and bakery meal, meeting all nutrient requirement of pigs; a negative control (NC) excluded inorganic phosphate and with reduced Ca (-0.13%) and ME (-0.15 MJ/kg); and NC supplemented with phytase at 500 or 1,000 FTU/kg feed. Diets were fed in mash form in 5 phases: starter (12 to 25 kg BW), grower 1 (25 to 50 kg BW) and 2 (50 to 75 kg BW), and finisher 1 (75 to 100 kg BW) and 2 (100 kg BW to slaughter). The NC group showed lower ( < 0.05) average daily feed intake (ADFI) and average daily gain (ADG) in starter and grower phases, lower gain to feed ratio (G:F) in starter and grower 1 compared with PC. Pigs receiving the high dose of phytase of 1,000 FTU/kg had improved performance vs. the 500 FTU/kg phytase treatment in starter and grower 1 phase compared with the PC in grower 1 phase. Increasing phytase dose resulted in a linear increase in ADG (12 to 120 kg BW) and G:F (50 to 75 kg BW). A comparison of treatment groups over the full production period from 12 kg BW until slaughter showed that both 500 and 1,000 FTU/kg phytase treatments were able to maintain growth performance and carcass characteristics compared with PC. The application of phytase could therefore be used as an effective strategy to replace all inorganic phosphate in diets of pigs fed corn, soybean meal, wheat middling and bakery meal based diets from 12 kg BW. An economic analysis showed greater return from both phytase treatments vs. the PC and favored the higher phytase dose at 1,000 FTU/kg vs. the traditional dose of 500 FTU/kg. The latter was mainly related to the improved performance of the higher dose in younger pigs to 75 kg BW.