BRUSSELS, BELGIUM — FEFAC, DAKOFO, and FS, representing respectively the European, Danish and Swedish feed industries, will co-host the 30th FEFAC Congress June 14-16 in Ystad, Sweden, dedicated to the “Resilience of Sustainable EU food production systems — Role of circular feed.”

 In the context of the current EU and global debate on EU food security and resilience of the EU agri-food chain, the congress explores how the European feed industry can assist the livestock and aquaculture sector to meet relevant EU Green Deal and sustainable food systems targets while providing affordable foodstuffs of animal origin to citizens.

EU, livestock and aquaculture as well as food and feed industry experts will discuss with experts from the European Commission and EU Swedish Council Presidency, the opportunities and challenges of circular feed and sustainable feeding techniques to facilitate the transformation of EU livestock and aquaculture systems. This takes place in the context of the first year of the new CAP reform and the announced publication of the EU legislative framework for sustainable food systems.

“The upcycling of nutrients through farm animals, converting secondary raw materials to highly bioavailable nutrients for human consumption, is an important part of our license to produce as European feed manufacturers,” said Asbjørn Børsting, president of FEFAC. “We can provide many concrete examples of advanced feeding techniques as highlighted in our new FEFAC publication, allowing us to increase the share in feed formulations of circular feed, not competing with direct human food use.

“We, therefore, invite the EU and Member States to encourage the uptake of advanced feeding systems via respective National Strategic Plan incentives (Eco-schemes etc.) to strengthen the livestock sector transition and contribution to a more resilient and sustainable agri-food system.”

Jan Rundqvist, president of FS, said the European feed industry has an important role to play in the overall ambition for sustainability and resilience.

“In this transition, we need to find the right balance and coherence of EU policy measures allowing the increase of circular flows in the food chain for which feed plays a pivotal role,” he said. “We share the EU Swedish Presidency’s priorities to foster the EU Circular Economy seeking to increase both EU’s feed and food and renewable energy autonomy. In these challenging times, we need each other more than ever and our cross-sectoral collaboration through FEFAC is of great importance to us all.”