Feed It: The Future for Local Stock Farmer

Indonesia is the one of biggest population country in the world which is consist of 256 million people. It influences the demand for the livestock product such as meat, egg, milk, and fish. Indonesia has a major potential of livestock resources but still cannot fulfil the national demand which leads to importing from another country. In this case, the supply of meat from cattle always needs to provided by importing from another country. According to the database of Indonesian Agricultural Ministry, the trend of meat from cattle import is tend to be increasing from this last 20 years. This condition influenced by the feed of cattle. 

Providing a high nutrition feed is costly for the stock farmer. Our action for combating this problem is provided sustainable, cheap, safe and nutritious feed to increase the amount and the quality of the livestock called Feed It!. Feed It! is made from some organic nutritious waste material such as fermented rice straw, bone and fish mill, and Morus alba leafs. These materials are abundant and priceless material but very high in nutritional value. Feed It! can be the solution to support the quality and quantity of future Indonesia’s livestock. 

There are four young actors behind Feed It! project: Hairil Fiqri, Venisa Yosephi, Sarah Devi Silvian and Widya Nur Habiba from Brawijaya University which is developing and doing research for this new kind of feed in the Thought for Food Challenge (TFF) 2017. They are from the Department of Industrial Biotechnology, Faculty of Agricultural Technology in Brawijaya University. The latest update of Feed It! is the testing directly to the livestock such as cattle, goat and poultry which is showing a positive feedback about the health and also yield (milk, egg, meat). 

Feed It! is working in several linked point of view according to this design statement:

1. Urgency
The urgency is about how the feed problem is burdening the stock farmer. Nowadays, a stock farmer spends 80% of total cost production for their livestock only to provide a feed which leads to low income for them. Some developing country, for example, Indonesia still cannot supply their national livestock product independently and rely on importing it. The nutrition of available feed cannot fulfil the need of livestock properly.

2. Consumers
Feed It! provide a feed that both conventional or modern stock farmer in the country are affordable and suitable using this product.

3. Concept

This feed is using potential biomass local resources to produce a cheap and nutritious feed for the stock farmers. Provide an opportunity for entrepreneurship in the sector of stock-farming with low-cost investment in the sector of cheap and nutritious feed production using the local biomass itself.

The fact is every 4 tonnes of rice grain, 6 tonnes of straw are produced. In Asia, this amounts to about 550 million tonnes of straw and 110 million tonnes of husks each year. The rice straw remains in the fields after harvest. About 70% of the fish is processed before final sale involves stunning, grading, slime removal, deheading, washing, scaling, gutting, cutting of fins, meat bone separation and steaks and fillets. The fish proteins are found in all parts of the fish which are 16-18 amino acids present in fish proteins. 

Fish waste contains high nutrition but not used optimally yet. Most of developing country is still independent of supplying livestock for their country. For example, Indonesia which still cannot fulfil their national livestock demand and set to import 700,000 live cattle and extra Indian buffalo meat next year. This case happens because the cost production of livestock in Indonesia spends 80% only for the feed and the lack of available feed nutrition content. In the other hand, Indonesia actually can produce the cheap and nutritious feed from utilising potential biomass such as rice straw and bran, tofu waste, fish bone and offals which are abundant in their country.

Expensive available Feed that spends 80% of total production cost in Indonesia requires a big capital and influence to the expensive price of local livestock product. A waste-based biomass could reduce the production cost and significantly increase the stock farmer income. Indonesia’s biomass waste potential contains a tremendous amount of nutrition that can be recycled to be a nutritious feed to increase the quality and quantity of livestock product to fulfil national demand independently. The local feed producer in a factory scale producing some wastes that influence the environment such as spoiling the soil water and produce odour harassment in the society. Using Feed It! as livestock feed will be more eco-friendly because it will reduce, optimise and get profit from waste rather than producing waste in the feed producing process like the previous feed producer.

According to the statement of Dr Agustin Krisna Wardani, STP., M.Si, Vice-dean of Agricultural Technology Faculty, Brawijaya University, Feed It! is a suitable solution in case of the utilisation and optimisation of local potential biomass especially Indonesia which is this resources that used as the ingredients of this feed is easy to get in the big amount. Even these ingredients are a waste but it contains basic and important nutrition such as protein, carbon sources. The way of adding mulberry leafs is supporting the other important part of nutrition such as vitamin and high mineral also gained from fish bone which made this feed is special. 

Another interesting fact about Feed It! is about the affordability for the stock farmer. It will be so helping if we compare that Feed It! will saving more than 100% of cost production for providing nutritious feed. It will indirectly help the stock farmer to increase their income and helping government program about livestock independence in 2020 by this small but important effort. About the problem of Indonesia beef import that still happened in this last 20 years, it is also influenced because of the risk of investment in this animal husbandry sector considering about the death, disease, vaccination factor and the high-cost production indirectly causing a degradation in the national stock farming sector. In this case, Feed It! can taking place in the “cost production” factor which is significantly reducing it.

"We want to help our country to be independent in providing meat for the national demand and try to turn back import to become an export. We have a dream that every country can provide optimise their own livestock production. We made a feed from abundant organic nutritious waste resources called Feed It!. The feed will save billion people in the world by optimisation of livestock quantity and quality by providing a cheap but nutritious feed. Feed It! will reducing the feeding cost and increasing the feed nutrition at the same time." Team Feed It!.