Nutritional strategies to optimize gut health and performance of weaned piglets: Part 3. A holistic approach to improve gut health and performance
Introduction
Swine industry has been trying to find alternative solutions to overcome the bann or restrictive use of antimicrobial growth promoters (AGP) and zinc oxide (ZnO) in weaned pig diets to control the incidence of diarrhea. In the previous two chapters, the nutritional concepts such as low crude protein diets (LCP), fortified diets with functional amino acids (FAA), balancing with soluble and insoluble fiber, as well as the use of feed additives, such as probiotic and organic acids, are suggested as some of the alternatives. However, these are not exclusive among each other, thus combinations of two or more of these strategies may bring further benefits and a more consistent response to improve gut health and performance of piglets. Therefore, different combinations will be discussed in this chapter.