Effects of feeding dried cashew apple pulp on zootechnical and economic performances of local pigs on station in the south of Senegal

This work carried out from December 2022 to April 2023 in Casamance was to evaluate the effects of feeding dried cashew apple pulp (CAP) on zootechnical and economic performances of local pigs. Eightyfour piglets including 39 castrated malesof 11± 0.1 kglive body weight (LBW) of 3 to 5 months were randomly divided into 4 treatment groups of 21 pigs each, subdivided into 3 replicates of 7 pigs, corresponding to 4 iso-nutritional dietary treatments viz., CAP₀, CAP₁₀, CAP₁₅ and CAP₂₀ for fattening pigs containing respectively 0, 10, 15 and 20% of CAP.A 12 days’ adaptation period for the pigs in the pigsty and the experimental diets was observed before the start of the trial. Then they were fed ad libitum with each meal diet and watered with tap drinking water. ALW, average daily gain (ADG), feed intake (FI), feed conversion ratio (FCR), carcass weights and dressings (CW and DC), and profit margins obtained per dietary treatment, were subjected to a one-factor ANOVA. The results revealed no significant difference (PÃ0.05) between the ALW, ADG and CW of pigs from different dietary treatments. The DFI of subjects in CAP₀ and CAP₁₅ were similar, but significantly (P<0.05) higher than those of CAP₁₀ and CAP₂₀ in contrast to the FCR. The production costs and net profits per fattening pig of CAP-based diets were also similar, but significantly lower and better than those of CAP₀. Feed cost and piglet purchase accounted for the largest share of these production costs. Economically, selling CW resulted in a loss for all dietary treatments contrary to pig selling based on LW. It was concluded that CAP can be incorporated up to 20% in the diet of fattening pigs without affecting their zootechnical and economic performances.