Research Groups | Biotechnology and Anaerobic Fermentation | Reduce Fish/Poultry Processing Waste by Anaerobic and Flesh Fly Digestion

Objectives of the integrated project

The project present coordinated European efforts to develop a unique process in establishing a sustainable human development and treat food processing wastes in an economic and ecological process, protect the environment and develop new medicinal products.

Need and relevance

The present project addresses the health hazards arising from the fish and poultry processing industries, which have a long history of concern with serious health and safety issues, including the treatment of the various waste streams from the plants. There is currently no profitable solution in most European countries for the large amounts of waste from fish and poultry processing plants, therefore this waste is incinerated, as part of the measures to prevent the spread of pathogens.

Description of the Project

Our proposal is submitted after we examined the Common Position adopted by the European Council on 20 November 2001 with a view to adopting Regulation (EC) No 12/2002 of the European Parliament. It will answer the following EC resolutions:

• The European Parliament, in its resolution of 16 November 2000 on BSE and safety of animal feed, called for a ban on the use of animal protein in feed until the present Regulation enters into force.
• Scientific advice suggests that the practice of feeding an animal species with proteins derived from the bodies, or parts of bodies, of the same species presents a risk of spreading disease. As a precautionary measure, this practice should therefore be prohibited. Implementing rules should be adopted to ensure the necessary separation of animal by-products destined for use in feed at every stage of processing, storage and transport. However, there should be scope to establish derogations from this general prohibition in relation to fish and fur animals if justified by scientific advice.
• From October 1996, the Food and Veterinary Office of the Commission (FVO) carried out a number of rounds of inspections in Member States, to assess the presence and management of main risk factors and surveillance procedures with regard to BSE. Part of the assessment covered the systems of commercial rendering and other methods of animal waste disposal. General conclusions and a number of recommendations were drawn up following those inspections, with particular reference to the traceability of animal by-products.
• The basis for Community legislation on health issues is sound science. To this end, the relevant scientific committees set up by Commission Decisions 97/404/EC and 97/579/EC should be consulted wherever necessary. In particular, further scientific advice is required on the use of products of animal origin in organic fertilizers and soil improvers. Pending the adoption of Community rules in the light of this advice, Member States may maintain or adopt national rules that are stricter than those envisaged in this Regulation, provided that such rules comply with other applicable Community legislation.
• A wide variety of approaches exists in Member States as regards the financial support for processing, collection, storage and disposal of animal by-products. To ensure that the conditions of competition between agricultural products are not affected, it is necessary to carry out an analysis and, if necessary, to take appropriate measures at Community level.
• In the light of the above, a fundamental revision of the Community rules applicable to animal by-products appears to be necessary.

From the Regulation (EC) No 12/2002 of the European Parliament we are referring to the part of Chapter I. In Article 1 part 2 (e) it suggest that catering waste will not be applied unless:

1. from means of transport operating internationally,
2. destined for animal consumption, or
3. destined for use in a biogas plant or for composting;

In Article 2, the EC Regulation define that For the purpose of this Regulation, the following definitions shall apply to

(d) Category 3 material: animal by-products.
The specific definitions set out in Annex I, Article 3 were apply to:

1. Animal by-products, and products derived therefrom, shall be collected, transported, stored, handled, processed, disposed of, placed on the market, exported, carried in transit and used in accordance with this Regulation.
2. Member States shall, either individually or cooperatively, ensure that adequate arrangements are in place, and that a sufficient infrastructure exists, to ensure compliance with the requirement of paragraph 1.

The definition in Article 6 on Category 3 material says that it shall comprise animal by-products of the following description, or any material containing such by-products:

• parts of slaughtered animals, which are fit for human consumption in accordance with Community legislation, but are not intended for human consumption for commercial reasons;
• parts of slaughtered animals, which are rejected as unfit for human consumption but are not affected by any signs of diseases communicable to humans or animals and derive from carcases that are fit for human consumption in accordance with Community legislation;
• animal by-products derived from the production of products intended for human consumption, including degreased bones and greaves;
• fish or other sea animals, except sea mammals, caught in the open sea for the purposes of fishmeal production;
• fresh by-products from fish from plants manufacturing fish products for human consumption;
• shells, hatchery by-products and cracked egg by-products originating from animals which did not show clinical signs of any disease communicable through that product to humans or animals;

It regulates that:

Category 3 material shall be collected, transported and identified without undue delay in accordance with Article 7 and, except as otherwise provided in Articles 23 and 24, shall be:
Transformed in a biogas plant or in a composting plant approved in accordance with Article 15;

In addition we examined materials published in Europe by Flair-Flow Europe, which focused on dissemination projects for food companies. They conducted five questionnaire surveys. Survey 1 involved prioritising nine R&D topics using a ranking procedure. The results showed that food safety/risk perception was ranked top priority of the nine listed R&D areas. This finding is in agreement with the high level of importance currently given to food safety, both nationally and internationally.
Survey 4 was on the level of participation of food companies in R&D activities.  Seventy three percent of respondees said that R&D was a strategic tool for their companies. Thirty-seven, 44 and 26% of companies participated in joint R&D activities at regional, national and EU level respectively. 'To obtain new technology was the main reason cited for participating in EU R&D projects, while financial considerations were the most cited of five reasons for NOT taking part in EU R&D projects.

Background

Anaerobic methanogenic thermophilic fermentation (AMTF) of wastes and digestion by rearing of flesh fly (Phaenicia sericata) and house fly (Musca domestica) larvae on the untreated raw material was done on a small scale. Results of rearing larvae on these wastes showed remarkable weight conversion to larvae. The yield from degradation of poultry waste by flesh fly was 22.47% (STDEV = 3.89) and that from fish waste degradation was 35.34% (STDEV = 12.42), which is significantly higher than that from rearing houseflies on a regular rearing medium. The bacterial content was significantly lower after thermophilic anaerobic digestion, with potential to eliminate pathogenic bacteria. The changes in the chemical composition of the components during rearing larvae were examined as well.
The project at hand presents an integrated way to use wastes from both the poultry and fish processing processes, by treating them by means of anaerobic methanogenic thermophilic fermentation (AMTF) and by breeding fly larvae, which digest the resulting slurry. The AMTF will be used mainly for wastes sources with high risk of infectious pathogens. It is clear that during the digestion by flesh fly larvae, a high percentage of the waste was digested. The larvae produced could be used as a resource for applications yet to be defined, but which could include chicks or fish feed or medicinal uses. The use of fly larvae as a means of utilizing organic wastes is an innovative approach that is also relevant to current environmental problems. The use of maggots (larvae) for medicinal purposes is recognized to have beneficial effects on wounds and has become more accepted in recent years. This IP plans to develop further this technology into pilot and semi-commercial stages in conjunction with Universities, Research Institutes, Processing Plants (including SMEs) and other end users.

We are mainly looking for SMEs and companies in the fields of poultry and fish processing industries, as well as academic associates in the fields of entomology with specialization/interest in flesh flies. With university researchers and SMEs’ collaborating on this subject, we hope to develop a new and economic technology. Not everyone in the small processing industries is interested in learning to develop these tools by himself or have the time to develop their own programmes. Furthermore, while “in-house” tools can empower individuals to create economical and ecological projects, they do not always help a small industry to answer the question, “does what I want to create already exist?” Because of this, duplication of effort is common.
On the other hand, the laws in ecological and environmental legislations are being strictly enforced  and affecting the SME’s profits.

Integration and structuring effect

The Integrated project has already several institutes and companies who are willing to implement the idea and participate in the research part as well as in the implementation part. The groups are from diverse characteristic and have expertise and uniqueness in their field. The research partners have most of the instruments and equipment to perform the research work. The companies who will participate have the wastes and are interested in solving the problems in economic and ecological methods.
The total estimated budget, for the planned 5 years of the project, is 28,700,000 Euros and the funding requested from the 6th Framework Programme is around 14,500,000 Euro.

Description of the Partner Organizations:

The Migal Institute is an independent, non-profit institution whose objective is to address the needs of industry and society through the development and dissemination of technological innovations. The Israeli Ministry of Industry and Commerce evaluated the Migal Institute as an innovative and creative institute. The Kimron Veterinary Institute is a well-known institute in veterinarian research and is very much involved in examining possibilities to help the poultry and fish processing industries.
The Institutes’ activities are implemented in collaboration with industry and its organizations as well as other domestic and foreign centres of expertise and government institutions.
The section for Anaerobic Fermentation, being a part of the Environment Division at the Migal Institute, handles a wide variety of ecological- and waste-related industrial problems resulting from manure and waste from food processing processes. Our work often involves multiple fields of knowledge resulting from the diverse background of our employees and extensive cooperation with other sectors.

The following is a list of candidates whom we want to approach, and their desired contributions:

• SMEs Fish processing industries in European countries
• SMEs Fish processing industries in Israel – Starkist Food D’Or, Israel*
• SMEs Poultry processing industries in European countries
• SMEs Poultry processing industries - Off-Hagalil, Israel*
• Larvae digestion - Yehuda Braverman, Kimron Veterinary Institute, Israel*
• Larvae’s Chemical and bacterial analysis - Alex Gelman, Kimron Veterinary Institute, Israel*
• High solid anaerobic thermophilic Digestion - Uri Marchaim, Migal, Israel*
• Anaerobic digestion with high fat content - Mats Edstrom, Swedish Inst. of Agr., Sweden
• Energy crops’ C/N adjustments and digestion - Peter Weiland, FAL, Germany*
• Co-digestion of bio-wastes - Rudolf Braun, Tulln University, Austria
  Scale-up and commercial aspects - Sergey Kalyuzhnyi, Moscow State University, Russia*
• Compostation - Eymontt Andrzej, Poland *
• Process modeling - Beart Hamelers, Wageningen University, Holland
• Degradation Modeling - Vasily Vavilin, Russian Academy of Science, Russia*
• Economic Modeling - Dimitris Georgakakis, Agricultural University of Athens, Greece
• Modeling approach to Bioreactors - Robbert Kleenebezen, Delft University, Holland
• Mathematical model for anaerobic digestion - Xavier Flotatas, Lleida University, Spain
• Commercial Aspects - Gerhard Langhans, Linde, Germany*
• Fish Feeding - Gad Degani, Migal, Israel*
• Poultry feeding - Joanna Sobczak, Poznañ, Poland
• Medicinal uses and production from larvae - Sanitary Aspects - Emer Colleran, Irish National University, Ireland
• Liquids and Sewage treatment - Robbert Franklin, Biotane, Holland
• Liquids and Sewage treatment - Tom Vereijken, Paques, Holland
• Commercial aspects of anaerobic digestion - Irini Angelidaki, Denmark*
• Application for developing countries - Rainer Wesenberg, Germany*

Those who already agreed in principle are noted with an *