NEWS 12 FEED & ADDITIVE MAGAZINE March 2025 Chipotle Mexican Grill announced it is making minority investments in CH4 Global, a company aiming to impact climate change at scale via methane-reducing innovations, and Plantible, a company harnessing the power of Lemna, an aquatic plant, to create what could prove to be the world's most functional plant-based protein. Introduced in 2022, Cultivate Next makes early-stage investments into strategically aligned companies that further Chipotle's mission to Cultivate a Better World and help accelerate the company's longer term growth plans to operate 7,000 restaurants in North America. CH4 Global is on a mission to deliver gigaton-scale emissions reductions over the next decade using whole, dried Asparagopsis seaweed targeting livestock methane. The company's flagship product, Methane Tamer™, is a feed additive that leverages Asparagopsis, with a goal of reducing methane emissions in cattle by up to 90%. Chipotle's investment will help CH4 Global scale production of Methane Tamer to meet burgeoning global demand for natural solutions to mitigate methane emissions from the world's 1.5 billion cattle. According to the statement, in addition to slashing methane output, Asparagopsis may reduce the feed energy lost to methane production inside the rumen area of their stomachs. This means that cattle could get more energy and nutrition from the same amount of food, which would help them grow or produce milk more efficiently while reducing their environmental impact. “As we all work toward the goal of minimizing global greenhouse gas emissions, it's vital for us to invest in companies like CH4 Global that are engineering scalable solutions to reduce harmful global emissions," said Christian Gammill, Cultivate Next Fund Manager. "Our investment in CH4 Global will help the team scale production of Methane Tamer™ to meet its current outstripped demand.” Read more>> Chipotle invests in aquatic plant-based technologies Alltech, one of the global leaders in biotechnology, released its complete 2024 U.S. Harvest Analysis report. The comprehensive final report shows that a combination of heavy early-season rains and late-season droughts has created distinct challenges for crop producers in the United States and indicates that overall risk is moderate to high. “The trend for corn grain and corn silage is somewhat higher across all regions of the U.S. than it was for 2023,” said Dr. Max Hawkins, Global Technical Support for the Technology Group at Alltech. “This increase in risk is due to the occurrence and levels of type B trichothecenes primarily, but zearalenone and fumonisins are also included in the increase, particularly in the Eastern U.S. The result is an increased pressure on animal health and performance that producers will need to monitor moving forward to maintain a proactive mycotoxin management program.” The final mycotoxin risk will ultimately depend on the animal species and groups being fed and the mycotoxin concentrations and combinations in the finished diet. Mycotoxins, which are natural substances produced by molds and fungi, are more prevalent — and more of a problem in agriculture — than ever before. More than 95% of crops today are contaminated with at least one mycotoxin, and usually with two or more. Because these toxins are difficult to detect, they can cause significant damage to animal health before producers even realize they are present. Read more>> Harvest analysis shows rising mycotoxin risks for corn
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTUxNjkxNQ==