Indonesian cattle farmers have improved their family life and income by adopting a farm management system pioneered by University of Queensland agricultural experts.
For the last three years, farmers on the Indonesian islands of Lombok and Sumbawa, east of Bali, have trialled the Integrated Production System (IPS).
Under the system, farmers selected better bulls, controlled seasonal mating, weaned earlier and managed diets and supplementary calf feeding.
Annual household cash flows on Lombok and Sumbawa increased respectively by 120 and 130 percent after adopting the system, according to UQ agricultural economist Dr Arlene Rutherford.
Dr Rutherford, who measured the economic benefits from the IPS, said farmers could save on labour costs, double their annual farm family incomes of about $250 and move closer to owning their own cattle rather than managing other people’s cattle.
She said environmental conditions had also improved as farmers used manure for fertiliser and cattle were moved away from the family home so there was less chance of contracting diseases.
The IPS was created by UQ livestock nutritionist Dr Dennis Poppi who collaborated with Queensland Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries principal cattle husbandry scientist Geoffry Fordyce and Indonesian agricultural groups.
The project was funded by Australia’s agricultural aid body, the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR).
Dr Rutherford will feature in a report about the Indonesian beef experiment on the ABC TV’s Landline program this Sunday (March 20) at noon and again on Monday (March 21) at 11am.
In the report, an Indonesian mother tells how she can now afford to send her children to school and provide healthier food for her family because of their work.
Dr Rutherford is now focusing on how to improve cattle marketing in Indonesia’s eastern islands and spreading the IPS.
To do this, she said farmers needed more information about the value of their own cattle via daily markets, TV, radio or government officials.
She said there was also a host of regulations, pricing methods, inter-island trade bans and quotas that complicated the farmers plight.
Media: contact Dr Rutherford (phone: 07 3365 2480, email: a.rutherford@uq.edu.au), Associate Professor Poppi (phone: 3365 2573, email: d.poppi@uq.edu.au) or Miguel Holland at UQ Communications (phone: 3365 2619, email: m.holland@uq.edu.au)
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