Methane Efficiency Index One of Five Finalists Awarded For Ability To Reduce Enteric Methane     

Semex and Lactanet are excited to announce that they are among five finalists from 86 applications in Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s Agricultural Methane Reduction Challenge for the novel trait Methane Efficiency.

Methane Efficiency breeding values were introduced by Lactanet in April 2023 genetic evaluations as a genetic solution to reduce methane emissions. Semex began publishing a Methane Efficiency Index for its bulls, and its global Elevate® users received evaluations for all genomic-tested females, providing dairies with a clear genetic solution and enabling faster conversion to a lower-methane herd. “If adopted across Canada, it could reduce methane by 20% by 2050 with no genetic sacrifice,” says Semex Vice President, Corporate Development, Drew Sloan.

Launched on November 14, 2023, the Challenge offers $12M in awards to innovators and, through this multi-step competition in the development and deployment of innovative, economically viable, scalable practices, processes, and technologies to reduce enteric methane emissions from cattle. As winner of Stage 2, Semex and Lactanet received $600,000 based on the results demonstrated from the testing and measurement of the Methane Efficiency Index’s impact within an operational requirement, in partnership with end users, including on-farm testing. For the third and final stage, they are required to demonstrate results in the acceleration and scale-up of the commercialization and/or adoption of the Methane Efficiency Index by acquiring new customers/clients and scaling for next contexts. The winner of the Challenge will be announced in Spring 2028. 

With support from Lactanet, Semex proposed the development of a breeding protocol and strategy that incentivizes dairymen to use low-methane genetics and to measure, record, and verify methane reductions over time. The project brings together Semex, Lactanet, and Dairy Farmers of Canada in a collaborative effort to support methane reduction through genetic selection.

For more information on this Challenge, please visit: https://impact.canada.ca/en/challenges/methanechallenge