This year, the successful School – the fourth in a row – saw several records:

• 80 attendees came to school, which is the highest ever number for any such Aviagen event.
• Another record was celebrated in the level of achievement in final test results with an average of 90.6 per cent of correct answers.

The School was five days long and covered topics such as incubation management with a practical session examining hatching egg content, preparation of farm for chick placement, veterinary questions, including designing a vaccination program and vaccination procedures. A new School topic discussed this year was the preparation of a flock for slaughter to minimise losses during transportation.

The highlight of the School was a visit to a broiler farm in the Lipetsk region, owned by Marco van den Broek from the Netherlands, a committed Aviagen customer, who has been developing broiler production in the country for the last five years. Mr van den Broek is well known to the poultry industry in Russia, mostly as a consultant in broiler management and nutrition; however, a few years ago, he decided to start his own broiler operation and today he produces about 60,000 tons of live broilers per annum.

Under his management, the farms work with an average EPEF of 380, growing a minimum 55kg of broiler liveweight per square metre. All farms work with the Ross 308 which, combined with Marco’s and his team’s professional skills, allowed his broiler farms to achieve an EPEF over 400. After the talk Mr van den Broek gave to the school students, he and his colleagues were presented with a certificate and a crystal trophy of the Ross 400 Club.

The award-winning Ross 308 broiler 2014 results are as follows:

• Liveweight: 2,542g
• Age: 40.42 days
• Mortality: 2.78 per cent
• FCR: 1.46
• EPEF: 419

School participants joined Aviagen in wishing Mr van den Broek the best for future results.

Tyark Osterndorff, Aviagen business development director for Eastern Europe, said: “We are very happy with another successful Aviagen School in Russia. I talked to many School attendees and was pleased to hear their high opinion about the level of organisation of this event, especially concerning the quality of the presentations and the practical sessions.

“I hope the information and knowledge the students gained will be successfully applied at their broiler farms. I wish them every success to continue to improve their broiler results.”