• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Near Infrared Spectroscopy Conference
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• 2001.06a
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• pp.1062-1062
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• 2001

The concept of “precision agriculture” or “site-specific farming” is usually confined to the fields of soil science, crop science and agronomy. However, because plants grow in soil, animals eat plants, and humans eat animal products, it could be argued (perhaps with some poetic licence) that the fields of feed quality, animal nutrition and animal production should also be considered in this context. NIR spectroscopy has proved over the last 20 years that it can provide a firm foundation for quality measurement across all of these fields, and with the continuing developments in instrumentation, computer capacity and software, is now a major cog in the wheel of precision agriculture. There have been a few giant leaps and a lot of small steps in the impact of NIR on the animal world. These have not been confined to the amazing advances in hardware and software, although would not have occurred without them. Rapid testing of forages, grains and mixed feeds by NIR for nutritional value to livestock is now commonplace in commercial laboratories world-wide. This would never have been possible without the pioneering work done by the USDA NIR Forage Research Network in the 1980's, following the landmark paper of Norris et al. in 1976. The advent of calibration transfer between instruments, algorithms which utilize huge databases for calibration and prediction, and the ability to directly scan whole grains and fresh forages can also be considered as major steps, if not leaps. More adventurous NIR applications have emerged in animal nutrition, with emphasis on estimating the functional properties of feeds, such as in vivo digestibility, voluntary intake, protein degradability and in vitro assays to simulate starch digestion. The potential to monitor the diets of grazing animals by using faecal NIR spectra is also now being realized. NIR measurements on animal carcasses and even live animals have also been attempted, with varying degrees of success, The use of discriminant analysis in these fields is proving a useful tool. The latest giant leap is likely to be the advent of relatively low-cost, portable and ultra-fast diode array NIR instruments, which can be used “on-site” and also be fitted to forage or grain harvesters. The fodder and livestock industries are no longer satisfied with what we once thought was revolutionary: a 2-3 day laboratory turnaround for fred quality testing. This means that the instrument needs to be taken to the samples rather than vice versa. Considerable research is underway in this area, but the challenge of calibration transfer and maintenance of instrument networks of this type remains. The animal world is currently facing its biggest challenges ever; animal welfare, alleged effects of animal products on human health, environmental and economic issues are difficult enough, but the current calamities of BSE and foot and mouth disease are “the last straw” NIR will not of course solve all these problems, but is already proving useful in some of these areas and will continue to do so.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Grassland Science Conference
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• 2002.09b
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• pp.5-56
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• 2002

The problems in the current domestic forage production were evaluated, and the prospective improvement was suggested in this paper. Grassland development in forest, production of high quality forages in upland and paddy land, efficient utilization of rice straw, development of new varieties of forages suitable for our environmental conditions and imported forages were described Among them, preferential production and utilization of forages using paddy field after rice harvest . should be enlarged for domestic supply of forages in Korea. Several studies were carried out to select the promising forage crops and barley cultivars for whole crop silage production, to determine productivity, nutritive value and production cost of forages produced in paddy field, and feeding effect of forages with Hanuwoo and milking cow for whole crop silage with forages produced in paddy field, 1999 to 2001, and also discussed restraint factors and activation plans for enlargement of forage production in paddy land. The promising forage crops in paddy field were rye and barley for Middle region, and rye, barley, early maturing Italian ryegrass and wheat for Southern region. The promising barley cultivars for whole crop silage in paddy field were Albori in Suwon, Keunalbori, Milyang 92, Saessalbori, and Naehanssalbori in Iksan, and Keunalbori, Albori, Naehanssalbori, and Saegangbori in Milyang, respectively. Silage production, quality and animal palatability of silage by trench and round bale were also compared. The production yields of whole crop barley silage(WBS) were 17,135kg as a fresh matter, and 6,011kg as a dry matter per ha, and the quality of WBS was 2∼3 grade, while that of rice straw silage was 4 grade as a farm basis. The production cost of WBS per kg was 83won as a fresh matter, and 238won as a dry matter. Feeding of WBS as forages on Hanwoo was very desirable for the improvement of live-weight gain, beef quality and farm income, particularly in growing stage of Hanwoo. Milk production and income were also increased, and feed cost was decreased by feeding of WBS. The daily voluntary intake of WBS in milking cow was 26.3kg as a fresh matter(DM 7.7kg) per head. Milk production when WBS was fed, was very similar to that of imported hay feeding such as Kentucky bluegrass or domestic corn silage. The issues to be solved in near future f3r stable forage production and supply in paddy land are sustainable livestock-forages policy, development & seed production of new varieties of barley, rye, Italian ryegrass and other promising forages, efficient demand & supply system of forages, solidification for mass production and utilization of forages, efficient application management of animal slurry on paddy field considering environmental agriculture/livestock industry, and break k development of bottleneck technique in production field. Domestic production & supply of high cost agricultural machine (round baler, wrapper, handler and so on), plastic wrapping film, and silage additives are also important.