FORTIFICATION OF DAIRY MILK WITH DOCOSAHEXAENOIC ACID (DHA) THROUGH FEED SUPPLEMENTATION OF DAIRY CATTLE FEED - A NEW HORIZON IN DAIRY INDUSTRY
Published: November 18, 2011
By: Iftikhar Ahmad, Umme-e-Aiman, and Khan Bahadar Marwat
Summary
Docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) is an omega 3 fatty acid essential for structural development of the brain and eyes in the infants and maintenance of normal vision and neural functions in adults. DHA is also vital for the integrity of heart and vascular system, and is implicated in relieving inflammatory conditions and arthritis pain and in preventing cancer. Human body cannot synthesize DHA sufficiently, which means it must be obtained through diet. The most common source of DHA is marine food, and interestingly a dietary deficiency of DHA is prevalent both in undernourished developing countries and in well nourished inland areas of the developed world. In a recent study of nursing mothers, lowest breast-milk DHA values (0.06–0.14%) found in Pakistan and inland areas of Canada have been attributed to a lack of dietary intake of marine food in these areas. In Canada, a novel approach of fortifying the dairy milk by supplementing the cattle feed with DHA-rich herring meal has been used to enhance the dietary intake of DHA in the country. In Pakistan, a homegrown source of DHA is
needed for supplementing cattle feed since the availability of marine food is limited in the country, and we intend to employ the marine red alga Crypthecodinium cohnii for this purpose. The alga is a prolific producer of DHA and has been used as a non toxic microbial source of omega 3 oil in many pharmaceutical supplements. It appears to be an effective dietary supplement since its addition to duck feed has been shown to result in a significant increase in the DHA content of the fed animal. We are therefore aiming at developing a sustainable mass culturing system for C. cohnii in Pakistan. The heterotrophic alga has been mass produced industrially both in bioreactors and in open pond fields and we intend to use these two methods for its sustainable production both for large scientifically managed “smart” dairy farms and for small to medium size family owned farms in different parts of the country. Our study is also focused on developing protocols for efficient algal meal supplementation regimes and for monitoring DHA and general nutritional status of the fortified milk. The study adopts a collaborative approach in order to benefit from the Canadian experience in custom designing the DHA-rich cattle feed.
Keywords: Milk, docosahexaenoic acid, feed, production
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