VUCA: Volatility - Uncertainty - Complexity - Ambiguity
VUCA: Volatility - Uncertainty - Complexity - Ambiguity
FarmManager is an "Objectives" focused "Pastoral Ecosystem Performance Management" tool. It Emulates and Integrates the Interaction of the Physical Environment (local climate, land form, slope, aspect, soils & vegetation), Available Resources, Resource Utilization & Management and the potential influence of Geo-Political and Socio-Economic views, demands and regulation, on the Performance of Grassland-Based Ecosystems.
It's focus is on provisioning stock with the feed they require if "Stock Production Objectives" are to be realized. It does not emulate any aspect of a dairy cow's metabolism, simply using their maintenance, milk (milk solids), live-weight, pregnancy and lactation energy requirements to calculate their feed intake.
All of the above influences, whether direct or indirect, can be factored into FarmManager's algorithms, from climate through land form, pastures and soils, stock policy and farm pasture cover production objectives to geo-political and socio-economic influences on resource utilization and management.
"Risk" (ISO 31000 - 2018 standard) is the "Effect of Uncertainty on Objectives." Whilst there are many potential sources of risk in a pastoral ecosystem, not the least of which include climate, provisioning and animal related issues. In FarmManager, however, the principal threat to the achievement of "Production Objectives" is failing to provision stock with the feed they need.
FarmManager both identifies and quantifies likely/potential provisioning threats (Pasture Feed Deficits) to the achievement of production objectives. Moreover, it flags them ahead of their occurrence, which makes it possible to prepare and implement appropriate contingency/remedial measures to mitigate them, thereby integrating the management of risk into everyday on-farm resource utilization/management and decision making.
Understanding the intricacies and idiosyncrasies of provisioning feed/stock-intake flows in a timely and appropriate manner in a pastoral ecosystem, is a skill that all graziers need, if they are to successfully realize an enterprise's production objectives. For those who have inter-generational pastoral farming experience and knowledge behind them, more often than not this is intuitive.
They Just Know.
Indeed many a Grazier's Lament when making a provisioning-related decision is:
"I know, that what I do today, the "Decisions" I make and the "Actions" I take, will have an impact on the performance of the pastoral ecosystem, not only today, but also tomorrow and maybe even, the far-off future! "
But, for those that do not have the benefit of inter-generation knowledge embedded in their sensory and memory banks, FarmManager can both guide and underpin their day-to-day resource utilization and management actions and decisions until, they too:
Just Know.
FarmManager's "RUM (Resource Utilization & Management) Plans" are Pastoral Farming's equivalent of Aviation's "Flight Plans". Both are Statements of Intent that incorporate:
FarmManager's "RUM Plan" Operationalizes & Executes Strategic Intent.
In most "AI" implementations, questions are framed in text-based queries. In FarmManager they framed and embedded in structured "RUM Plans", thereby ensuring that the outcome of a query is based upon and constrained by the physical environment and resource utilization/management in which a pastoral ecosystem is embedded.
Sophisticated queries can be embedded in a RUM Plan, where it is possible to vary multiple components of an ecosystem, inclusive of rainfall and temperature, either alone or in combination.
This capability makes it possible to quickly and easily, through the experience of "actually doing" (i.e. simulating the performance of a "Pastoral Ecosystem"), acquire knowledge and understanding of the many ways in which it can respond to the environment in which it is embedded.
It could, by way of example, be through the impact on "Production Objectives" of:
"Average Pasture Cover" was first used as a grazing management tool over 45 years ago in "Pastoral Ecosystem" research undertaken by the author and developer of FarmManager. The original "Sward Stick", the forerunner of the products available in the market today, was developed at this time, to manage the pasture cover of experimental pastures.
This research demonstrated the influence of "Pasture Cover" (Herbage Mass) on the performance of a "Pastoral Ecosystem", and in particular the dynamics of pasture tissue flow, the grazing behaviour (pasture intake, bite size and time spent grazing) of ruminants and their productivity (live weight gain, etc.).
In the last decade or so, a general recommendations for temperate grassland "Average Pasture Cover" (APC) and "Residuals" for dairy enterprises have emerged, these being to maintain APC between 2000 and 2300 kg DM/ha and Residuals between 15-1600 kg DM/ha. The rationale underpinning the "rule of thumb" for APC being that if it is too low, cows will be underfed and if it is too high, then pasture quality and growth will decline and production will be reduced accordingly.
FarmManager provides a holistic helicopter view of a Pastoral Ecosystem's Performance throughout the four seasons of a year in response to the prevailing Climate, Objectives, Resource Utilization & Management dictates of a RUM Plan. It presents in picture form, the outworking of a RUM Plan strategy to date and projects into both the immediate and far-off future. In doing this, it provides a forward-looking context to provisioning (Resource Utilization & Management) deliberations for today and tomorrow.
Sample text. Click to select the Text Element.