GERMANY- BENEO, a leading functional ingredients manufacturer, has added faba bean ingredients range to its animal nutrition portfolio to meet the growing demand for sustainable plant-based options for feeds and pet food.
BENEO’s new range includes faba bean protein concentrate, starch-rich flour, and hulls, representing sustainable alternative sources of protein, starch, and fiber that enable feed manufacturers to improve the nutritional profile of their products.
According to Karel Thurman, Commercial Director of Animal Nutrition at BENEO, “Manufacturers of pet food, and feed are increasingly faced with the challenge of finding ingredients that deliver the necessary nutrients for their formulas, while also complying with ambitious commitments towards sustainability.”
The faba bean ingredients range will provide BENEO with convincing sustainability credentials and offer producers of animal feeds and pet food sustainable nutritional alternatives for their formulations.
Sustainability is increasingly becoming a common concern among consumers, and pet owners and livestock farmers are not exempt.
According to consumer research conducted by BENEO and FMCG Gurus, 25% of pet owners worldwide perceive products with plant-based or vegan claims as healthier and better for the environment.
Moreover, sustainability concerns are also under greater scrutiny from authorities, forcing many feed producers to commit to ambitious targets to meet these changing requirements.
Apart from providing protein alternatives for feeds and pet food, faba beans help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at farm level by utilizing nitrogen from the air, which reduces the need for fertilizer input.
BENEO sources their faba beans at Farm Sustainability Assessment (FSA) Gold level from German farmers, keeping energy and water consumption low, further contributing to their sustainability targets.
Sourcing from local farms, with long-term contracts in place, also allows the ingredients’ manufacturer to avoid present and future price pressures and logistical and supply issues.
Range offers dynamic nutritional benefits
Apart from being a sustainable source of ingredients for the feeds and pet food industry, faba beans’ nutritional applications are dynamic.
While still containing a residual protein of approximately 20% BENEO’s faba bean starch-rich flour offers livestock and aqua feed producers a good source of starch and energy.
With this nutritional profile, this flour can be used in salmon and trout fingerlings’ feeds, as well as in broilers’ starter and piglets’ weaner diets.
It can also be an ingredient in liquid feeds like calf milk replacers, thanks to its good solubility and relatively low iron content.
Additionally, BENEO’s faba bean protein concentrate has a good amino acid profile and is a good source of vegetal protein alternatives to animal and soy proteins.
On the other hand, BENEO’s faba bean hulls can be used to provide a source of insoluble fibers in feed for ruminants or gestating sows.
Another significant advantage of BENEO’s faba bean range is that they are from faba bean varieties with low antinutritional factors like tannins, vicine, and convicine, and are also guaranteed to be non-GMO, which is still a contentious issue globally.
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