In this article, I discuss two major challenges that many farm CEOs face that tend to limit their ability to deliver a consistent quality of balanced feed to their livestock – especially in Nigeria/Africa.

1. Poor Feed Compounding Know-How

Apart from knowing the ingredients’ nutrient compositions in order to formulate rations, there is also the often ignored aspect of proper feed compounding i.e. milling/grinding and mixing of the physical feed ingredients for the animals to eat (using the derived formula as a guide).

If feed compounding is not well done, a derived ration formula will yield little or no useful value!

Alternative ingredients like Sorghum, from trials done by researchers, and feedback from farmers who use it, show that it needs to be milled to a certain consistency, if it is to be well utilized by animals fed a ration in which it replaces maize.

Some farmers are not familiar with best practice feed compounding. A good ration formula, poorly compounded, gives poor results! Compounded feed with poor palatability and/or digestibility will be poorly consumed or utilized- and the animals will not perform well.

Extension specialists must verify that farmers understand the importance of proper feed compounding. Those identified to lack it must be given needed “education” – and/or encouraged to compound rations at a feed mill where required best practices are observed.

2. Lack of Adequate/Accurate Nutrient Composition Data for Feed Ingredients

The farmer must also know what his animal’s nutrient requirement is, at different stages of growth and production (See figure 3 in Annex 1.0).That’s why laboratory analysis of ingredients (and compounded feed) must be periodically done.

In Nigeria, farmers lack ready access to laboratory facilities. So many use data from published sources – mostly foreign. But that’s best used only as a temporary guide. Chemical composition of food grown locally in Nigeria differs considerably from those in tem5perate climes – due to complex interactions of factors like soil, species, strains, climate etc.

But Nigerian farmers contend with unusual additional costs e.g. most generate up to 80% of their power supply, and even drill boreholes to supply safe water for their animals.

That can often be a disincentive to sending feed/ingredients samples for laboratory analysis.

Standard feed composition tables, featuring locally available feeding stuffs can greatly mitigate these challenges, making farmers more willing to use software formulation.

Extension specialists can collaborate with relevant others to make those tables available. Locally available ingredients that can replace expensive/less available ones must be included.

A useful foundation on which to build has been provided by some workers.

Extension specialists can incorporate tables they compile, into their custom Excel-VB software. Farmers would then use a few mouse clicks to choose feed ingredients using drop menus in any combinations they want, to formulate least cost rations (e.g see screenshot from my Excel-VB Ration Formulator software below).

This article is based on excerpts from the international agribusiness paper in which I advocate adoption of Excel-VB solutions development by Extension professionals, to support farm businesses with their data handling, analysis and report generation needs.