Artificial Intelligence: Paving The Way For Traceability

It may be a weighty term, but artificial intelligence (AI) will play a significant role in the intensive beef cattle industry in future. This is according to Dr Andy Hentzen, senior lecturer at the Faculty of Veterinary Science at Onderstepoort’s Production Animal Science Department, and clinical manager of the Production Animal Clinic at Onderstepoort Veterinary Academic Hospital.

- Izak Hofmeyr

It all starts with the electronic ear tag, he says, and initially it does not matter which ear tag is used, whether high or low frequency. However, the high-frequency tag presents many advantages, the most of important of which is that the scanner can detect the frequency from the ear tag over a greater distance.

This means that animals do not have to be pushed through a crush one by one in order to obtain data from the tag. A group of animals can enter the crush together and the scanner will pick up each ear tag and forward the data to the computer software. “This not only reduces the hours worked, but also reduces stress in the animals. And this is just the beginning,” says Dr Hentzen.

Data that spans an entire lifetime

Dr Hentzen sketches the following scenario to illustrate his point: Every animal entering the feedlot is equipped with a high-frequency ear tag attached at birth. The animal’s data has been recorded since birth, which means that its entire breeding and medical history is known to the feedlot operator.

While in the feedlot, the animal’s history is kept up to date, including the type and amount of feed the animal receives, its average daily weight gain, and its medical treatments. The information captured is very accurate and the human factor is eliminated.

Better information means better decisions, which ultimately relates to feedlot profitability. With the correct treatment date captured, the scanning of marketable animals can identify those animals that have not yet gone through their withdrawal period.