The 1,550 delegates from 71 different countries who attended Alltech’s 22nd International Feed Industry Symposium were challenged by “new realities” in equine nutrition. Those present at the annual three-day Symposium, which was held April 23-26 in Lexington, Ky., were presented with the emerging new sciences of glycomics, which involves the metabolic activity of complex sugar molecules, and nutrigenomics, which relates nutrition to gene expression.

Highlights from some of the renowned consultants and academics from the equine sessions include:

• Dr. Ernest Bailey of M.H Gluck Equine Research Center, Lexington, Ky., spoke about moving horse genomics across disciplinary lines. He highlighted the implications genomics has had on transforming management practices and foodstuffs in livestock and the influence it has had on the array of genes that are expressed throughout the tissues of the horse, even without considering the hereditary potential.
  
• Dr. Jan Matras, Institute of Animal Nutrition, Poland, discussed the role of Bio-Mos in mares in relation to milk quality and blood parameters. He said that Bio-Mos is well established in livestock diets and it has a significant effect on blood parameters related to immune response.
  
• Dr. Chris Jacobi, Farnam Companies, Inc., USA, spoke about Farnam’s story and how the company markets equine products to the industry. He discussed the importance of being fully engaged and close to the customer. He also spoke about addressing market segments and how branding overcomes price discussion.
  
• Dr. Kyle Newman of Venture Laboratories, Lexington, Ky., emphasized that colic in horses is a multifactorial problem, part of which is influenced by the stability of the bacterial flora. He recommends supporting fiber digestion and stabilizing pH consistently.

Other speakers included Dr. Ronan Power and Dr. Kate Jacques from Alltech; Dr. Peter Ryan of Mississippi State University, and Dr. Johanna Fink-Gremmels from Utrecht University,The Netherlands.

Dr. Pearse Lyons, founder and president of Alltech, closed the Symposium by asking delegates, “if they were ready for the road ahead,” and “if they know their marketplace and the irresistible forces that are prevailing in modern society.” He encouraged them to imagine a world with no oil imports and no feed shortages