Factors affecting wheat nutritional value for broiler chickens

In Europe, broiler chickens are fed with balanced diets where the energy is mainly supplied by wheat. The feed industry considers wheat a moderately uniform raw material and therefore its energy content and nutrient digestibility are taken from feeding tables (tabulated values) and assigned to all wheat grains. However, all major wheat-producing countries report considerable variability in energy content of wheat which invalidates the assumption of uniformity among wheat grains and forces the industry to look for the factors responsible of the variation. This PhD has focused on the study of factors that affect the nutritional value of wheat for broiler chickens. After the literature review, few nutrient components of the wheat grain (starch and non-starch polysaccharides) where selected and deeper studied in different wheat cultivars fed to broiler chickens. Emphasis was put on the rate of wheat starch digestion by broiler chickens and its effect on broiler performance.