21 Aug 2018
A service to increase business resilience
Alltech® Navigate™ seeks to drive margin from inputs through mapping opportunities. Alltech says the process gives farmers direction and is a customer journey, rather than just a single transaction. The Alltech adviser provides advice and ideas to help farmers tackle the key issues identified.
Increasing business resilience is critical in ongoing times of uncertainty and uncontrollable pressure.
Fertility, forage quality, cow health and feed conversion efficiency are examples of factors that are within the farmer’s control.
Improving performance in these areas will better equip farm businesses to cope with external factors outside of the farmers control.
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For example, compliance programmes, market volatility, environmental and other supply chain pressures.
Feed efficiency is the primary driver of input utilisation and understanding this and the hidden waste for all feed inputs is multi-factorial.
As much as 45 per cent of all grown and purchased feed inputs are either lost or under-utilised from field to ilk, equating to a financial impact of almost £1 for every £3 spent.
These losses relate to diet, but also how silage and feed is stored, fed out and presented to the cow.
Additionally, the cow’s environment, health and fertility are crucial drivers.
All these factors influence whether the cow is able to maximise the efficiency of what she is eating and convert it into high quality profitable milk
“Wastage is something you never write a cheque for, but your business pays for it every day.”
ADVISER CHARLIE MORGAN | GRASSLAND AND GRAZING CONSULTANT
The Alltech® Navigate™ service consists of three simple steps:
ASSESS
The four main stages where losses typically occur will be examined. Some of the key pinch points within this stages beyond visible wastage are as follows:
-In the field: re-seeding levels, wilting time, mowing cut length, poaching, utilisable dry matter and energy yields.
-During storage: Mould clamp seams, clamp temperature, bulk densities, lamp slippage, silage ash
content.
-At feed-out: sorting, efusals, mix consistency, loading accuracy.
-Inside the cow: housing, rumen function, health, fertility.
ANALYZE
Secondly, the data collected at the assessment is consolidated and calculated through the programming tool.
The data is then converted into percentage losses and monetary values to show where the losses are occurring, at what scale, and why.
The farmer can then fully understand the value of feed waste and input under-underutilisation.
ACTION
Finally, a concise report containing impact analysis and actionable recommendations is produced and presented to the farmer.
The actions will be prioritised according to investment and financial opportunity, and achievable targets will be agreed.
The report will also benchmark against a comparative group.
Five reasons to choose Alltech® NavigateTM
- Alltech® Navigate™ aims to be a consultative long-term support service which enables the farmer to remain in control while supported by a trusted professional who will identify opportunities and actions to enable cost savings to be made.
- Understanding the scale of the financial losses and potential gains will enable the farmer to prioritise actions.
- Some actions will be low cost, simple and possible within a short timescale.
- Other recommendations may be more expensive, but lead to greater savings over a longer period.
- Even small steps when combined may lead to significant improvements to the bottom line, offering a roadmap to profitability.
Alltech Navigate Hub
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