For this week's blog post, BRI Market Development Manager Juan Carlos Rosa-Medina interviewed Dr. Mike Williams, Director of the NC State University Animal and Poultry Waste Management Center (APWMC).
What are the new initiatives behind the APWMC and what do you plan to focus on as the Director?
Currently we have three major initiatives in our center: 1) A joint project with the College of Engineering and the College of Natural Resources at NC State where we offer university support for startup companies who want to create bioenergy from waste substrates. 2) Research on pre-harvest food safety issues related to waste management, which could help overcome issues we’re facing today like antibiotic resistance and salmonella outbreaks, and 3) Continuing research on our core topic: waste management.
Which states are doing the best job in animal waste management? Which countries?
On the management side, I think that all the states are doing a better job compared to a few years ago, but we can still learn a lot from some European countries. In a recent symposium that we organized, we learned that the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany have already collected two decades of emissions data, which allows them to create mitigation strategies on emissions. It would be fantastic if we could have the same data for the US. With that information, we could plan ahead for example, how to change nutrition to meet emissions standards.
Several poultry science experts we have interviewed have mentioned waste management as a key issue for the poultry industry going forward. Would you you agree?
No doubt about that. Long-term sustainability depends on how we address waste management issues for better health and less mortalities in animal production for example. Also, it's been proven that just by increasing the quality of air we can achieve better growth in animals.
Why is animal and poultry waste management such a difficult problem to fix?
There are three main reasons to that: 1) Because there’s been a historic focus on productivity alone, and state legislation historically has not focused on the environment. 2) It has been difficult to develop technologies that are economically feasible, and 3) We don’t have a mandatory carbon credits market system in the US.
What sort of advice would you give to a young person interested in pursuing animal science or poultry science as a career?
As an academic, I have the opportunity to advise students on a daily basis. I always tell them that as the population increases, the world is going to need affordable protein sources, but this growth is also going to bring an increased focus on environmental issues, so students have to be prepared to confront those competing demands.
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