The efficiency of poultry production is dependent upon the optimum utilization of feed for maintenance, growth, production, and reproduction. Thus for the determination of the biological efficiency of the feed and its nutritive value, chemical analysis of the feedstuffs for total phosphorus contents is not a reliable index of its adequacy. The chemical and physical association in which the phosphorus occurs must also be taken into account. The increased use of vegetable protein sources in poultry feeds further strengthens the idea due to the limited availability of phosphorus from vegetable sources.

As phosphorus is needed by all forms of life, for health, growth, production, and reproduction, and of its role in energy metabolism, synthesis of sugars, maintenance of acid-base balance in the body fluids, and bone development, both the quantity and availability of dietary phosphorus is of critical importance for growing birds. Unluckily the availability of phosphorus in plant sources is limited due to the presence of a naturally occurring compound phytate (myo-inositol hexaphosphate) and is also referred to as phytic acid. It is widespread in plant seeds, roots, and tubers. Phytic acid occurs in feeds as salts of calcium, zinc, potassium, and magnesium and with other minerals forming a mineral phytate complex also known as phytin. Phosphorus and other minerals when bound to the phytic acid they become poorly available which was already well documented in studies on humans, chicken,s and pigs (Annonumous, 1996). Poultry can utilize only one-third of the P contained in feedstuffs of plant origin, since they lack the phytase enzyme necessary to hydrolyse phytate,  due to this reason phosphorus, protein, and other minerals bound to phytic acid are excreted as such in the faeces of the birds. The excess of phosphorus and nitrogen excretion will not only causes a great threat to our environment but also results in an increase in feed cost (Cromwell, 1989).

According to Nelson (1968) the phytate phosphorus (pP) content may, on average, vary between 56-68% of the total phosphorus (tP) content in the commonly used cereals (corn, grain sorghum, wheat, barley and oats), which are the major components of poultry feed and from 61-70% of the tP in soybean meal and cotton seed meal. However, the variation in pP contents is higher in protein-rich feedstuffs like soybean and rapeseed meal. This low biological availability (about 30%, NRC, 1994) of pP has boosted the demand for mineral P supplementation. The cost of the traditional inorganic P supplements in Pakistan poultry diets (dicalcium phosphate, DCP) has gone up while its availability has gone down. The dire need for an economical source of P for poultry rations prompted researchers to make available pP in the body of birds.