Could kalo be Hawaiʻi’s new superfood for chickens?

High feed costs and a reliance on imported feed are everyday challenges for Hawaiʻi’s poultry farmers. However, the College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resilience (CTAHR) at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa may have found a promising locally grown alternative: kalo (taro).

Assistant Extension Agents Yunuen Bustamante and Melelani Oshiro’s firsthand observations sparked interest in evaluating kalo as a viable feed. Bustamante raised poultry and small livestock at Kualoa Ranch before becoming a livestock agent for CTAHR’s Cooperative Extension arm. 

“When I joined the CTAHR team, a poultry farmer reached out to me asking, ‘Could my chickens eat kalo leaves and kalo corm?’ That was the first idea,” said Bustamante. “The second came from a kalo fest around the same time. I thought this was something that could be useful to our stakeholders.” 

Bustamante and Oshiro’s dive into existing literature indicated that kalo leaves offer a high protein content, essential vitamins, and are easily digested by poultry. 

“I think a lot of folks use kalo as feed for livestock because on your farm you’re going to use what you have, but I don’t believe there have been detailed studies about kalo as a food source for poultry here in Hawaiʻi,” said Oshiro.

The review concluded that replacing 5–7% soybean meal with kalo leaf meal can help poultry grow, increase nutrition in their feed, and potentially save money for farmers.

This work is part of CTAHR's mission to increase the state’s agricultural self-sufficiency and reduce its dependence on imported goods. By using locally available resources such as kalo, farmers can achieve greater resilience with culturally relevant ways to raise poultry and livestock. 

The next steps for Bustamante and Oshiro are to look into locally grown ʻulu (breadfruit) as feed for Hawaiʻi livestock.