Effects of non-genetically and genetically modified organism (maize-soybean) diet on growth performance, nutrient digestibility, carcass weight, and meat quality of broiler chicken

OBJECTIVE: This study was conducted to compare growth performance, nutrient digestibility and meat quality of broilers fed a genetically modified organism (GMO) diet or a non-GMO diet. METHODS: A total of 840 broilers with an initial body weight of 43.03 g per chick were randomly allocated into 1 of the following 2 dietary treatments lasted for 32 days (15 broilers per pen with 28 replicates per treatment): i) Trt 1, GMO maize-soybean meal based diet; ii) Trt 2, non-GMO maize soybean meal based diet. Both diets were maize-soybean meal diets. The GMO qualitative analysis, proximate analysis and amino acid analysis of the feed ingredient samples were carried out. Diets were formulated based on a nutrient matrix derived from analysis results. Growth performance was measured on day 0, 7, 17, and 32. And all other response criteria were measured on day 32. RESULTS: The analysis results showed that the total Lys, Met, Thr of non-GMO grains were lower than that of GMO grains, the protein content of GMO soybean meal was higher than that of non-GMO soybean meal. Feed intake and feed conversion rate (FCR) were greater (p<0.05) in broilers provided with non-GMO diet than that of the GMO group from d 17 to 32. A decrease in FCR was observed in birds fed the GMO diet through the entire experiment (p<0.05). No significant impacts on blood profile, meat quality and nutrient digestibility were found in response to dietary treatments throughout the experimental period (p>0.05). CONCLUSION: These results indicated that non-GMO diet showed a negative effect on growth performance but nutrient digestibility, blood profile, carcass weight and meat quality were not affected by non-GMO diets.