Kazakhstan: lack of feed hampering livestock development

The plant feed deficit means the animals do not receive sufficient energy and protein in their diets Also recent evaluations have shown that Kazakhstan is currently using its feed resourses more inefficiently than any other country in the CIS region.

These factors have meant that the animal productivity potential only reaches 50-60%, resulting in the republic continusouly losing a significant amount of very scarce meat and dairy products. In addition, dietary imbalances in energy and protein nutrition leads to a major (25-30%), overuse of feed resources, thus increasing the proportion of grain forage, which further worsens the economic performance of the feed production and animal husbandry –the Kazakh-Zerno report pointed out.

Another factor is that plant protein in Kazakhstan is in short suply mostly because compound feed production is generally of a poor quality with a very low plant protein consistancy. Currently, about half of the total dry matter (hay, silage, haylage and straw) of winter rations for cattle contains 4-10% crude protein, instead of 12-13% required for the animals with an average productivity – the report added.

For a long time now farmers have been unable to solve the problem of the lack of protein in the concentrate mix of their own production. The low percentage of protein (10-11%) is associated mainly with the lack of protein supplements. In countries with a highly developed livestock industry (Japan, Canada, USA), the protein supplement share is about 16-34%, and in Kazakhstan it is only 6-7%. Due to lack of protein components more than half of the concentrated feed used is imbalanced in protein and amino acids, which leads to huge cost overruns of grain and reduces the profitability of livestock production.