Feeding the Future of Profitable Poultry Production
As Canadian consumers continue to choose poultry as a dietary protein source, University of Guelph researcher Dr. Elijah Kiarie helps Ontario poultry farmers produce birds that are healthy and feed-efficient and raised in a more sustainable way.
Published: Tuesday, July 15, 2025
Lead photo: A group of chicks
Impact
Alliance research helps Ontario poultry producers raise healthy, efficient birds more sustainably, supporting the province’s more than 2,000 poultry and egg farmers who contribute roughly $1.8 billion to the provincial economy.
Industry relevance drives applied studies by Kiarie, an Alliance-funded researcher who teaches in the Ontario Agricultural College and holds the McIntosh Family Professorship in Poultry Nutrition. He studies nutritional strategies to improve bird productivity and health, and use of novel ingredients to reduce feed costs and environmental impact.
Profitable, sustainable food production is important for poultry farmers. But Kiarie sees big challenges with rising feed costs and a push to reduce reliance on antibiotics.
In particular, he says, inefficient feed use can lead to health and environmental consequences. “Unused nutrients in the gut promote the growth of pathogens that require antibiotics, and those nutrients are excreted in manure and increase the carbon footprint of the operation,” says Kiarie.
Better gut health for better productivity
Birds need a healthy, functional gastrointestinal tract to be productive. Kiarie hopes to enhance the immune system and resiliency of neonatal chicks and ultimately replace antibiotics for growth promotion.
Dr. Elijah Kiarie, Professor of Monogastric Nutrition, Animal Bioscience
He has studied the effect of adding dietary bioactives—ingredients like probiotics, seaweed and fruit pomace—to enhance gut health and function, and has investigated the feeding and management of broiler breeders to produce healthier progeny.
“There is often a disconnect between how broiler breeders are fed and the quality of broiler chicks they produce,” says Kiarie. “In our research, we enriched the breeders’ diet with omega-3s and demonstrated that the resulting broiler chicks could benefit in terms of growth, stronger bones and protection against enteric pathogens.”
When it comes to improving gut health and performance, some of Kiarie’s research spans other species. One of his recent applicable innovations is a novel probiotic that improves weaned pig growth performance. “The strain of bacteria is isolated from camel feces and has properties that improve intestinal health when used as a probiotic,” says Kiarie.
Preparing future leaders for industry careers
Training the next generation of poultry industry leaders is one of the most fulfilling parts of Kiarie’s role. “Undergraduate and graduate students continue to show interest in poultry science and particularly in poultry nutrition,” says Kiarie, who has supervised 33 graduate students and post-doctoral researchers to date.
“Our research examines issues that are important to the scientific and poultry communities,” he says. “We are preparing our graduate students to compete in this high-impact field of study and provide future leadership in feeding the growing human population.”
Most of his former students work in the feed and poultry industry as nutritionists and managers at feed companies, veterinarians, technical service advisers for feed additive companies, and researchers in Canada and abroad. One graduate is a broiler producer.
Kiarie is well aware that Alliance funding provides a unique opportunity for U of G researchers like him, and for his students.
It provides access to animal and feed processing facilities, including the Ontario Poultry Research Centre, which is owned by the Government of Ontario through its agency Agricultural Research and Innovation Ontario and managed by U of G through the Alliance.
“We can run trials with laying hens and broiler breeders at a relatively low cost to produce meaningful data,” Kiarie says. Project Operating Funding has been pivotal for my research for providing seed money to leverage with NSERC and industry to enlarge the scope of investigations.”
Helping farmers get more with less
Kiarie looks to produce applied research results for farmers. “I am very interested in solving producer problems, so our research focuses on ways to improve feed efficiency with the goal to get more meat and eggs from less feed.”
Ensuring that his research reaches intended audiences is also the goal of partnerships with producer organizations, including Egg Farmers of Ontario, Egg Farmers of Canada and the Canadian Poultry Research Council.
“I make every effort to share results with poultry producers at education events and extension activities,” says Kiarie. “I have given many presentations and encourage students to translate our published research into industry newsletters to increase the knowledge reach.”
This research is funded by the Ontario Agri-Food Innovation Alliance, a collaboration among the Government of Ontario, its agency Agricultural Research and Innovation Ontario, and the University of Guelph.
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