Feed demand calculator developments

Summary

The FDC has been upgraded to include new pasture species, new regions, new ways to show results, improved Feed On Offer calculations, supplements and includes now Environmental indicators.  Some issues that became apparent during the training workshops are were resolved.  For example, fine-tuning of the wastage and senescence calculations, instructions in pop-up boxes, column labels need to be undertaken.  
A face to face meeting with Eric Zuker was held on July 12 in Canberra.  The revised version of the FDC has been tested at 4 workshops (Adelaide, Melbourne, Hamilton Wagga Wagga) attended by 22 private and state agency staff.  Over 85% of attendees indicated that they would use the FDC tool more in the future than previously.  Main use was to test new systems for self-learning and working with groups of farmers.  Main topics studied were changes to livestock management, use of alternative pasture species and different seasonal conditions. 
Tips and Tools document was completed as required. The new pasture data, new pasture supply techniques are seen as significant improvements on previous versions of the FDC. The changes to the FDC make it more useful to extend the results from projects such as EverGraze or for use with programs such as MMfS and MBfP. 
Limitations:  Increased security by Microsoft on Excel post 2007 made it extremely difficult to use the FDC tool for an increasing number of users.  Ways to overcome this problem were not immediately apparent.
Opportunities:  The workshops identified a strong demand for a simple tactical Feed Demand Calculator (mobile phone app), i.e. a tool that allows calculations in the field, of the impact of feed supply and animal demand on liveweight and condition score in the next 1-2 months.