Farm to Feed Forum – cropping, cotton and silage for cattle.

Day 1: Presentations, panel sessions and producer insights on growing and feeding local crops to cattle – focussing on cotton and silage.

• Cattle nutrition & supplementary feeding in the NT
• NT cotton industry trajectory
• Cotton – growing & feeding
• Silage – growing & feeding
• Producer insights
• Markets & logistics

Day 2: Field trips to local cotton and silage enterprises & facilities.

NT cattle producers are often at the mercy of the harsh environment that they operate in. There is a heavy reliance on wet season rain to provide enough pasture to get through the year, and if that fails, options are limited (or expensive). Native pastures in the NT that cattle are graze can be low quality, and buying in or growing supplementary feed is not always straight forward. What are the opportunities for pastoralists to utilise the local cotton industry? What about silage, is it worth a go? How do the options stack up?

Cotton is a relatively new industry for the NT, and an opportunity for the livestock industry to improve cattle nutrition. The Katherine cotton processing facility opened in 2024, with over 47,000 bales processed to date. Each bale, on average, produces 245kg of cotton seed. This equates to about $6.9 million worth of cottonseed produced since the processing facility opened.

Cottonseed high energy and high protein, and a sought-after feedstuff for cattle. However, most of the cottonseed coming out of the Katherine cotton processing facility is being exported due to higher demand overseas. This forum aims to explore the potential benefits of integrating the NT cotton and cattle industries, how pastoralists can get their hands on local cottonseed and what feeding strategies there are to lift cattle production.

Another hot topic is silage, and haylage. Silage offers the opportunity to store and transport fodder without losing the nutritional value of it once cut. Some NT pastoralists are successfully growing and producing silage, and/or feeding it to cattle. This forum will investigate methods, as well as dive into the logistics, challenges and potential of growing, processing and feeding silage in the NT.

Register here.