Modeling and forecasting livestock feed resources in India using climate variables

The availability and efficient use of the feed resources in India are the primary drivers to maximize productivity of Indian livestock. Feed security is vital to the livestock management, extent of use, conservation and productivity enhancement. Assessment and forecasting of livestock feed resources are most important for effective planning and policy making. In the present study, 40 years of data on crop production, land use pattern, rainfall, its deviation from normal, area under crop and yield of crop were collected and modeled to forecast the likely production of feed resources for the next 20 years. The higher order auto-regressive (AR) models were used to develop efficient forecasting models. Use of climatic variables (actual rainfall and its deviation from normal) in combination with non-climatic factors like area under each crop, yield of crop, lag period etc., increased the efficiency of forecasting models. From the best fitting models, the current total dry matter (DM) availability in India was estimated to be 510.6 million tonnes (mt) comprising of 47.2 mt from concentrates, 319.6 mt from crop residues and 143.8 mt from greens. The availability of DM from dry fodder, green fodder and concentrates is forecasted at 409.4, 135.6 and 61.2 mt, respectively, for 2030.