USE OF ANALYTICAL HIERARCHY PROCESS BASED ON PRODUCTION PERFORMANCE /COST/ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT, IN EVALUATING THE EFFICIENCY OF COMPOUND FEEDS FORMULATIONS FOR LAYING HENS

V. Criste, Tatiana Dumitra Panaite, Alina Banciu, Gabriela Vasile, Rodica Diana Criste, Madalina Arama

Abstract
    The efficiency of diet formulations that include food industry by-products (rapeseed meal, grape seeds meal, buckthorn meal, pumpkin meal and flax meal) was assessed based on the results of a feeding trial on laying hens (160 TETRA SL layers, 56 weeks) using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). The methodology involves pair comparisons made by a group of evaluators, which express the relative importance of the criteria and diet formulations that are considered. AHP users first break down the decision problem into a hierarchy of sub-problems that are easier to understand and which can be analysed independently. Three types of criteria were established on the basis of which each evaluator made the hierarchy: (c1) technical (laying percentage and average egg weight); (c2) economic (cost and feed conversion ratio); (c3) ecologic (physical-chemical and microbiologic indicators with ecologic relevance). The assessed compound feeds formulations had the same basal composition (17.44% crude protein and 11.72 MJ/kg feed metabolisable energy) but differed by the added by-products: E1 (9,5 % rapeseed meal + 3 % grape seeds meal); E2 (8,73 % flax meal + 3% buckthorn meal); E3 (9 % pumpkin meal). Based on the production performance, costs and environmental impact, formulation E1 (with rapeseed meal and grape seeds meal) performed best under these particular experimental conditions.

Key words: AHP methodology; criteria; laying hens; compound feeds formulations; by-products