Abstract The growing–finishing pig sector faces increasing pressure to improve economic efficiency while reducing environmental impact and maintaining animal health and performance. Feed represents nearly half of production costs, and conventional phase feeding relies on population averages that fail to capture the substantial variation in nutrient requirements among pigs and across time. Precision feeding (PF) along with precision nutrition strategies aim to deliver the right amount and composition of feed at the right time to each animal, thereby improving nutrient utilization and reducing waste. Precision feeding approaches range from refined phase feeding to group precision feeding (GPF) and individual precision feeding (IPF), which dynamically adjust dietary nutrient supply using real-time feed intake and body weight data integrated with mechanistic–empirical models of protein deposition and nutrient requirements. This presentation synthesizes two decades of research evaluating PF implementation in growing–finishing pigs, including controlled experiments and emerging on-farm applications. Compared with conventional feeding, GPF has demonstrated substantial reductions in nutrient intake and excretion, including decreases in standardized ileal digestible (SID) lysine intake (−17%), crude protein intake (−10%), nitrogen excretion (−12%), and phosphorus excretion (−15%). Individual precision feeding further improves nutrient efficiency while maintaining growth performance, reducing feed costs by approximately 8–10% without compromising average daily gain or carcass traits. Recent research highlights additional benefits of IPF, including reduced lysine intake and nitrogen excretion by up to 20%, decreased crude protein intake by 13%, improved gain-to-feed ratio (∼4%), and reduced carcass fat deposition while maintaining body weight. On-farm implementation studies indicate that adjusting lysine supply to body weight can reduce time to market by approximately 5 days and increase income by up to 9% when lighter pigs receive higher lysine concentrations. Beyond nutrition, precision feeding systems generate continuous behavioral and intake data that enable early disease detection through changes in feeding patterns, supporting targeted health interventions and improved herd management. At a systems level, PF has the potential to reduce nitrogen and phosphorus excretion by up to 40%, decrease greenhouse gas emissions by up to 8%, and reduce production costs by up to 15%. Collectively, these results demonstrate that precision feeding is not merely a refinement of phase feeding but a transformative approach integrating sensors, mathematical modeling, and automated feeding technologies. The transition from “one-size-fits-all” feeding to dynamic, individualized nutrition represents a key opportunity to enhance sustainability, profitability, and resilience of modern swine production systems.
Aline Remus (Wed,) studied this question.