A new dashboard system designed to help compound feed manufacturers produce safe feed is being developed in the Netherlands.
Researchers at Wageningen University are building the system, which is intended to identify feed safety hazards at an early stage in the manufacturing process.
The dashboard, currently called the “Digital Support System” (DSS), uses 10 years of historical monitoring data, such as trends over time and world maps showing the presence of contaminants in animal feed. The contaminants of current focus are mycotoxins, dioxins, heavy metals and pesticides.
Feed companies have supplied monitoring data on hazards in feed ingredients, and the university mined other open data sources to build the data body with information like country of origin, weather conditions, trade environment, and socio-economic factors.
Using machine-learning techniques, they utilized the data to develop prediction models for the presence of specific hazards and specific levels.
Dashboard users can choose from a comprehensive range of feed ingredients, potential contaminants, and countries of origin. They can also see an overview of the presence of hazards within a selected country over the past 10 years to get predictions from the AI model for the likelihood that contaminants will be present in the future.
The developers say they hope the DSS will be a global tool used to identify safety hazards at an early stage in the feed manufacturing process. They noted it will be usable by feed manufacturers from anywhere in the world. And, they predict the model could easily be used to develop similar, hazard-avoiding dashboards for food manufacturers.
The DSS is being developed as part of a 4-year project in collaboration with SecureFeed, GMP+ International, and Trouw Nutrition. They will be the first organization to test-drive the system before it becomes available worldwide.
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