AN increasing number of feed advisers in Scotland are joining the Feed Adviser Register (FAR) – run by the Agricultural Industries Confederation (AIC) – which assures livestock farmers that advisers have a high level of training, skill, knowledge and professionalism.

The register, launched in 2013, now has more than 1100 members across the UK with 139 in Scotland.

Donald Harvey, chairman of AIC Scotland’s feed executive committee, believes that the register’s growth is a key step forward in terms of professionalism.

“By raising standards amongst Scottish feed advisers, we will help our farmer customers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while improving productivity and efficiency," he said.

"This, in turn, will increase our responsibility and accountability, particularly on environmental sustainability.”

FAR was launched with the specific objective of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from livestock. According to UK Government commitments, agriculture must meet an estimated 11% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and livestock farming will play a significant part. As recently as March this year four Scottish Parliamentary committees criticised the Scottish Government’s lack of detail on how these reductions would be achieved in agriculture.

While some areas of agricultural advice have had long established schemes for Continuing Professional Development (CPD), BASIS being the best known, there was no equivalent for feed advisers until the Register was created. Such schemes allow advisers to maintain and measure their professional development and keep up-to-date with new techniques and legislation. They also give farmers a degree of assurance about the standard of knowledge that advisers can deliver.

Russell Allison of Galloway and Macleod is a member of FAR. He says: “We need a strong Feed Adviser Register to deliver professional development for members, sustainability for our farmer customers and to help government to meet its targets of reducing on-farm greenhouse gas emissions.”

To qualify for Full Membership of FAR, a feed adviser must have a minimum of 12 months’ experience. Those with less experience can enrol as development members with their advice supervised by a full member for a year, and complete the appropriate i-validation. Once they have achieved the full year and completed the necessary training, they can upgrade to full membership.

Membership must be renewed every 12 months following completion of set core competencies. Advisers on the register are audited to ensure their training and experience is legitimate, and since the beginning of this year they have been able to validate their core competencies through online i-validation.

FAR training operates in modules. The first two introduced covered animal feed planning, and links from feed to animal health and fertility. Once advisers have completed these modules, they progress to FAR Module 3 which covers environmental emissions and policies in two parts.

Membership, therefore, helps feed advisers to keep up with the latest thinking on feed regimes, and deliver productivity improvements to their clients, as well as helping the industry to meet government sustainability targets.

Key benefits for farmers are:

• The assurance of professionally recognised and up-to-date advice

• Recommended feed regimes that are best for animal health and well-being

• Advice that will reduce costly inputs, increase yields and reduce your enterprise’s carbon footprint

• Advice that will meet the needs of both industry and Government

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More information about FAR

All members of FAR carry a registration card.

Full Member Registration Card

Development Member Registration Card

Farmers can check also the status of their feed adviser by using the online status checker on the FAR website – www.feedadviserregister.org.uk – which provides more information about the scheme, including details of how to become a member.

The website also features recently-produced case studies from Scottish-based feed advisers and videos explaining the scheme and giving practical examples.

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Boosting beef production efficiency

Feed adviser Ian Houston of Tarff Valley Ltd worked with one of his clients who runs a suckler beef herd and was able to demonstrate how both productivity and sustainability could be improved by making changes to the feed regime.

In the herd of 150 commercial beef animals, crude protein and DUP (Digestible Undegradable Protein) levels were altered to improve daily liveweight gain (DLWG) and early frame growth, followed by sustained detailed ration formulation during growing

and finishing.

As a result, slaughter age was reduced from 21 to 17.5 months, concentrates per head reduced from 1.3 to 1.25tonnes and DWLG increased by 0.2kg. Finishing times were reduced by 100 days, effectively reducing methane emissions.

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Increased milk yields from forage

Lewis Graham, a feed adviser with ForFarmers, worked with his client’s 120-cow dairy herd to improve performance, and increase sustainability and cow welfare. Following a ration review, advice was implemented to allow cows to utilise more home-grown produce. Field walks and grass sampling before harvest helped to ensure forage quality was at its optimum before cutting.

A focus on management of dry cows and fresh calved cows helped to get cows ready to milk and give the best start possible. Improving dry matter intake meant that freshly calved cows could eat more forage and produce more milk. Milk yields have increased from 8000litres to 9000litres, harvesting and forage utilisation has increased.?Better yields have helped to improve sustainability, while better cow management has improved overall welfare.