Brochure on forage production (Establishment management, harvest)

Ohmstedt, U. (2021) Brochure on forage production (Establishment management, harvest). Nairobi (Kenya): Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT. 35 p.

Feeding of livestock is a critical point in all livestock production. Proper feeding is influencing livestock’s development, health, productivity and reproduction rate. This applies for all sectors of livestock keeping. Of course, also other factors like genetics, health care, animal welfare etc also influence the performance of cows, but even if all these elements are well respected, feeding will be the determining element for reaching out to the dairy cows’ potential. It is a well known fact, that many dairy cows are underfed in quantity and quality. This leads to under performing cows and makes dairy farming less economic.

It is also well known that feeding costs have a share of up to 70% in dairy production and such an interesting trigger. If the dairy farmer manages to feed its cows with better quality feed at a lower cost, dairy farming will become much more economic.

Production and feeding of forages is a way for better feeding and higher profitable dairy farming.

This brochure on forage production is providing you with information on forage production. Most information is extracted from other earlier published materials and combined in this brochure to give you an overview from establishment, management, harvesting to feeding. It also shows you on some examples how profitable forage growing can be and gives some ideas of earning money with forages.

You also find links to Shamba shape up episodes on improved forages as well as for a series of videos explaining forage production and use.