Kumasi, April 30, GNA- The Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) in conjunction with the Animal Science Department of Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) has held a day's workshop in Kumasi to sensitise poultry farmers in the Ashanti Region on the health and socio-economic benefits of RE3, a livestock performance enhancer and poultry additive.

RE3 comes in the form of liquid and is derived from natural and organic resources comprising barley grain, wheat, canola, alfalfa plant, among others.

It contains no toxic chemicals and is used by mixing poultry feed by using normal micro ingredient equipment and techniques.

In an address, Professor Stephen Osei of the Animal Science Department of KNUST, pointed out that a team of researchers from the department undertook studies using the Livestock Performance Enhancer as a feed additive in Poultry Feeding for some Livestock as a case study of the efficacy of the RE3.

He said the first case involved an eight-week study involving broilers and the second involved a 16-month study of egg-laying chickens, comprising six months of growing period and 10 months of laying. "The results indicated that feeding RE3 significantly improved the growth and performance of both broilers and layers without adversely affecting the health of the birds", Professor Osei said. He stated that birds on RE3 supplemented diets have lower mortality rate than those on Antibiotics and that it also reduces the cost of producing birds and eggs.

"RE3 improves the general poultry performance as it increases weight gain in broilers, egg production, egg weight, poultry health, reduces cost of production and is also environmentally friendly", the Research Scientist noted.

Professor Osei indicated that the long term idea behind the introduction of RE3 unto the Ghanaian market was to ensure that poultry farmers got discouraged in the use of antibiotics as additives to poultry feed and concentrated on RE3 for long term economic benefit.