The agriculture and livestock industries face enormous challenges to feed the 9.6 billion people forecast to inhabit the planet by 2050, and recent estimates by the FAO suggest that to meet demand food production needs to increase by 70%. This is despite limited arable land availability, unpredictable weather patterns, the increasing need for fresh water resources and economic stressors. So how can we meet these huge challenges? By harnessing nature with technology – and one of the smartest new technologies rising to meet this challenge is smart sensing tech designed to make agricultural and animal feed practices more ‘intelligent’.
Due to economies of scale, modern farmers are pressured to care for increasing numbers of livestock. Maintaining animal health and performance at a high level requires strict regimens and first-class nutrition management, which takes valuable time, energy and resources. One way smart farming technology can help in redressing this time/effort balance is by helping farmers monitor animal feed and forage effectively, efficiently, and in real time.
This is where the new generation of smart sensors come into play, leading with the SCiO micro-spectrometer. NIR Spectrometers have been used for decades in the feed and forage sector, and are the gold-standard in feed analysis and portable spectrometers are increasingly making headway into analyzing feed and forage on location. However, the high cost, unwieldy size and weight, along with the sensitivity and potential risk of damage, have made the logistics of deploying portable spectrometers at field level prohibitive. But not anymore, extremely portable, low cost, and easy to use, SCiO brings affordable, high performance feed and forage analysis directly to anyone who needs it, wherever they need it. Real nutritional analysis on location – in the silo, grain bin, feed mixer or in the field – allowing you to adjust, mix, and add rations smartly as and when needed, and ensure your livestock gets the best nutrition regime possible.
With a SCiO molecular sensor, feed and forage quality is easily analyzed and instant, accurate results are sent directly to your smartphone – no guesswork, no costly time-consuming lab work, no hassle. All the major macro-nutrient parameters, protein, energy, fat, moisture and more can be monitored and adjusted according to individual needs, substantially influencing ration cost, supplementary feeding and animal performance. SCiO’s patented, award-winning miniaturized spectrometer, combined with powerful cloud-based machine learning analytics, provides a realistic solution to developing precision feeding techniques to optimize livestock economic and environmental performance at farm level.
This revolution in smart farming tech allows anyone involved in animal feed and livestock management to deploy lab grade near-infrared spectrometry directly in the field. Farmers, veterinarians, farm consultants, managers, farm hands, regardless of their level of expertise, can perform fast, reliable, non-destructive material analysis whenever, and wherever they need them. By deploying SCiO, you can now easily adapt feeding strategies to improve animal wellbeing and quality of food, and mitigate potential environmental impacts through a sustainable animal feed process.