750043NIPigsClosedVouchersInnovate UKThe idea is to use natural extracts from plants to improve the performance of pigs making the diet more organic and reducing the need to incorporate high levels of copper and other metals in the diet. Reducing levels of metals in the pig diet will hopefully reduce levels of the same metals in the pig flesh, thus reducing health problems for consumers who may have allergies and/or reactions to metals in their diets. Certain metals can trigger aggressive behaviour in children, whereas some other medical conditions do not allow consumers to excrete metals from their body (people with Autism are one example) By reducing metals in the animals diets, lower levels will be excreted from the animal in its dung, a commodity used to fertilise agricultural land. In some of the low countries, pig production is reduced as conditions are placed on how much dung can be spread per hectare of land to reduce metal build up in the soil and water table. My idea would reduce the impact of environmental pollution thus allowing an increase in food production in Europe.