Feeding and Funding Low Emission Dairy: Developing Novel English-Grown Faba Bean Feeds and a Carbon Insetting Mechanism to Monetise Emissions Reductions for Farmers

This project will generate robust evidence on the systemic impact of adoption of UK-grown faba bean-based feed ingredients as a viable alternative to imported soybean meal in UK livestock product value chains.

The core research will evaluate the methane-reducing potential of faba bean hulls and toasted faba beans, and their combination, in ruminant diets. This builds on findings from the Defra-funded Nitrogen Climate Smart project which demonstrate the viability of faba bean processing to improve their use in poultry feed.

By linking this with new research into ruminant methane mitigation using co-products from the processing of faba beans for poultry feed, the project enables a comprehensive life cycle and economic assessment of homegrown faba bean use across livestock value chains.

SRUC focus will be on testing hulls and toasted faba beans from a wide variety of faba beans in vitro for their methane reduction potential and nutritional value. Selected candidates will be fed to dairy cows to assess impact on methane emission, milk production and nitrogen balance. Trials will inform environmental impact through life cycle analysis accounting for both the hull (direct methane reduction) and the toasted faba bean (indirect carbon saving from reduced soya input), combined with dehulled bean benefits in other sectors (soya replacement in monogastrics).