Smart sheep: precision livestock farming and sustainable sheep production

智能羊：精准畜牧业和可持续羊生产

• 批准号: 51340
• 金额: $ 25万
• 依托单位: MOREDUN RESEARCH INSTITUTE
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Collaborative R&D
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2020 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=51340
• 关键词: Smart; sheep; precision; livestock; farming

This project addresses the adoption of precision livestock farming (PLF) technologies in sheep farming. PLF has been widely adopted in the management of high-value animals e.g. dairy cattle, but is not currently applied to those with lower economic value, e.g. sheep, despite the potential to increase production efficiency. In the UK, there are around 23.3 million sheep, including 14.7 million breeding ewes worth approximately £690 million to the economy. Since 2010, all individual sheep in the UK are equipped with EID (Electronic Identification) tags, further paving the way for use of PLF technologies. However, uptake is a major issue. A recent survey of European sheep farmers showed that only 38% of farmers have any EID equipment, which are rarely used for sheep management. Likewise, in the UK, a survey of PLF technology adoption showed that 55% of farmers did not have and did not intend to adopt EID technology for management purposes.The project consortium will engage with end-users (members of the farming community and farming advisors) early in the project, to co-design tools to increase the uptake of PLF on-farm. We will use one proven PLF tool; an existing pen-side tool to optimise lamb worming, using an algorithm for the early identification of under-performing lambs. This Targeted Selective Treatment (TST) has been developed at MRI and validated at MRI, SRUC and on commercial farms, including one facilitated by 5Agri. The adoption of TST reduces wormer use and labour, and the costs required. Importantly, it slows the development of wormer resistance. Farmers have described a clear need for this type of approach on farm. However availability to the farming community is currently hampered by the lack of a user-friendly method for farmers to access the algorithm. This project will facilitate the integration of the algorithm into a cloud-based platform, thereby making it easily accessible to farmers.Validation of the improved technology will be performed on 10 'innovative' and 2 research sheep farms across the UK, covering a range of geographical locations and using commercially appropriate sheep breeds to ensure evidence that is relevant to a wide range of sheep farms. Cost-benefit analysis and carbon foot-printing of implementing the new approach will be conducted.The results of this project will be disseminated through on-farm knowledge exchange events at strategic locations across the UK to demonstrate the ease, accessibility, cost-benefit and environmental benefit of using this integrated pen-side TST approach.

该项目致力于在绵羊养殖中采用精准畜牧养殖（PLF）技术，PLF 已广泛应用于奶牛等高价值动物的管理，但目前尚未应用于绵羊等经济价值较低的动物。英国大约有 2330 万只羊，其中包括 1470 万只种母羊，其经济价值约为 6.9 亿英镑。自 2010 年以来，英国所有羊都配备了装备。然而，最近对欧洲养羊户的一项调查显示，只有 38% 的农民拥有 EID 设备，而这些设备很少用于 PLF 技术。同样，在英国，一项关于 PLF 技术采用情况的调查显示，55% 的农民没有也不打算采用 EID 技术进行管理。该项目联盟将与最终用户（以下组织的成员）合作。农业社区和农业顾问）在项目早期共同设计工具，以增加农场对 PLF 的吸收，我们将使用一种经过验证的 PLF 工具来优化羔羊驱虫。这种有针对性的选择性治疗 (TST) 已在 MRI 上开发出来，并在 MRI、SRUC 和商业农场（包括由 5Agri 推动的 TST 的采用）中得到验证。驱虫剂的使用和劳动力，以及所需的成本，重要的是，它减缓了蠕虫剂抗性的发展，农民们已经明确表示需要这种方法，但目前农业社区的可用性因缺乏用户而受到阻碍。该项目将促进将该算法集成到基于云的平台中，从而使农民可以轻松访问该算法。改进的技术将在 10 只“创新”羊和 2 只研究羊上进行验证。各地农场英国，将覆盖一系列地理位置并使用商业上合适的绵羊品种，以确保与广泛的绵羊养殖场相关的证据，以及实施新方法的碳足迹。这一结果。该项目将通过在英国各地战略地点举办的农场知识交流活动进行传播，以展示使用这种集成笔端 TST 方法的便捷性、可及性、成本效益和环境效益。