The livestock and poultry industry in India is a bigger industry than what most non agricultural people would suppose it to be. The nation has one of the largest herds of cattle in the world. The growth of poultry productions has been in a steady pace in the last twenty years. Fisheries, goat rearing, pig rearing - animal husbandry as a whole provides about 30 per cent of the agricultural GDP and aids the livelihood of tens of millions of rural families.
Behind it all that must be an industry of feed, which must operate at massive scale, day in, day out. This blog will discuss the main elements of the livestock and poultry industry in India, how the feed industry has kept this industry alive and the challenges and opportunities that await the animal husbandry in India.
The Indian animal farming is changing. The transition of backyard farming to semi-commercial and fully commercial production, especially in poultry and dairy, has dramatically altered the requirements of farmers of their feed suppliers. Mixed kitchen and agricultural waste was fed to backyard farmers. Poultry farmers with tens of thousands of birds in a controlled setting, require precision nutrition. The two are totally different needs and the industry has been forced to adapt with these changes.
The current quality push is fuelled by economics and partly by biology. In poultry farming, feed usually makes up 60-70 percent of the total production expenses. Even minor changes in feed conversion ratio (quantity of feed it takes to generate one kilogram of meat or a set number of eggs) directly affect the profitability in a measurable way. This is cognized by farmers in a manner that was not universal ten years ago. It is not only about animal welfare but also about the bottom line since better feed means better bottom line. Such a change in perception has altered the requirements of serious buyers when they come to animal feed suppliers.
The poultry industry in India is centralized - Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and West Bengal are the biggest producers, but the poultry industry is spread across the states. Nutritional needs of broiler farming and layer farming are different and feed schemes of these two are different.
The feed given to broilers is generally divided into three stages: starter (first two weeks or so, high protein), grower, and finisher. Striking the protein-energy balance in each stage is what most of the formulation-effort of the poultry feed manufacturers is devoted to. The main components, maize, soybean meal, fish meal are no secrets, but the trace mineral and vitamin blends, which translate average and really high-performing feed, are where technical potential comes in to distinguish between good manufacturers and mediocre ones.
Layer feed is different. The level of calcium is much more important (to the quality of the eggshells), the energy density is adjusted in a different way and the feed is changed when the birds are older. Good poultry feed producers realize that layer nutrition is a separate science, not a variation of broiler feed.
The quality commercial poultry feed market in India is big and increasing. The sector is moving towards integration (where one company owns breeding, feed, farming and processing) though independent commercial poultry farmers, who are still the predominant, rely fully on the open market to supply them with feed.
The figures in the table above are not constant in all breeds and climates, but change according to genetic factors, housing, and the temperature of the area.
The market of cattle food in India functions differently as compared to poultry. The most common application case is dairy - India is the largest milk producer in the world, and milk production and composition directly depend on the nutrition of dairy cattle. The suppliers of cattle feed in India cater to the large commercial dairies as well as to small-holder farmers with two or three cows and the demands of the two extremes of the market are vastly different.
The more advanced one is the compound cattle feed which is a balanced combination of energy, proteins, minerals and vitamins in one product. It is applied in commercial dairy intensively. Conventional feeds such as cottonseed cake, groundnut cake, wheat bran and rice bran are still popular especially among the small farmers who blend their own rations or use local feed dealers.
The dilemma associated with cattle feed quality is that the issue of adulteration has been a historical issue in the Indian market. Replacing inferior protein sources, agricultural by-products of poor grade, under-specifying of mineral premixes - these have been practiced and farmers have been scalded by them. Serious cattle feed producers have retaliated with more stringent quality standards, third-party testing, and branded products that will gain the confidence of farmers over several seasons. Once built, that trust is sticky. Farmers that have experienced the difference in yield with quality feed will seldom revert.
Livestock feed India also includes goat farming (growing fast due to meat demand), pig farming (located in certain regions and communities) and rabbit or specialty animal farming - all minor markets, but which when added together are large.
The market of animal nutrition is a new and growing segment, which includes feed supplements. These are not generic feed supplements: probiotics to ensure gut health, enzyme supplements to enhance feed digestibility, amino acid supplements, vitamin and mineral premixes, immunity boosters, toxin binders to manage mycotoxins, non-antibiotic growth promoters to improve performance.
The deregulation of animal feed (a regulatory push that has been in progress) by withdrawing antibiotic growth promoters has in fact increased the market of legitimate animal feed supplement suppliers significantly. The farmers who were used to using sub-therapeutic antibiotics to keep the growth rates and gut health in check must find alternatives that will work. This has resulted in a shift of products such as probiotics, organic acids and enzyme-based products to mainstream.
The quality of the supplements is varied. It is a place where the underdosing or replacement of inactive components are difficult to notice without laboratory analysis. To buyers - farms or feed manufacturers including supplements in compound feed - it is really significant to deal with suppliers who deliver consistent, verifiable product specifications.
Fishing and shrimp farming has grown tremendously in Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha and Gujarat. Aqua feed has become one of the most rapidly expanding portions of the general animal feed and the nutrition science of aqua feed differs in comparison to that of the terrestrial animal feed.
The manufacture of aqua feed is technical due to high-protein formulations, water stability (feed should be cohesive enough in water until the fish consumes it) and species specifications. Increased demand of quality aqua feed has been increasing at a higher rate than domestic production capacity in certain areas thus presenting real supply opportunities.
In the case of large scale customers purchasing bulk animal feed products be it in large commercial animal feed operations, in the feed trading or in the production of feed, there are a few items that are always important regardless of the category. These are not detailed specifications, but they are those which make the difference between a working relationship with suppliers and a troubled relationship with suppliers:
Raw material traceability: The traceability of the maize, soybean meal, and fishmeal used by the compound feed is important not just to your own quality control but also to meet export quality requirements should your farmed animals or products find their way into international supply chains.
Formulation transparency: A feed producer who provides nutritional analysis and ingredient composition and supports it with frequent testing by a third party - is a very different offer compared to someone who just provides a price and a delivery date. Documentation push.
Large poultry and dairy farmers: Always mention this as the most important thing to them. The change in composition between batches causes production issues, which are costly and disruptive to handle. The additional sourcing to locate animal feed suppliers that make this a priority is worth the additional effort.
Storage and logistics infrastructure: Feed quality decays over time, heat and moisture. Knowing how a supplier has their product stored and what their delivery schedules actually look like, particularly when dealing with bulk orders, can help to avert the type of quality drop that can silently sabotage a complete production cycle.
Minimum order flexibility: Not all buyers require a truck-load. The suppliers that can satisfy different quantity of orders without punishing the smaller purchasers on either price or service will be of great use to the middle-sized farming businesses that are growing larger.
The quality animal feed is in demand in the poultry and livestock industry in India. With the increase in protein diets along with incomes, and the expansion of farming practices to larger and more complex scales, farmers are putting an emphasis on feed efficiency, and are ready to pay a premium based on quality rather than price.
To manufacturers of poultry feeds, cattle feeds and to the feed supplement market in general, the potential is high. The farmers who are spearheading this demand are getting more enlightened and those suppliers who deliver their demand in transparency and competitive prices will flourish.
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