Premier Quality Kenya Dairy Business Plan — Housing, Water and Equipment

Cubicle housing, water provision, milking and chilling equipment, and the infrastructure a zero-grazing herd requires.

Housing, Water and Equipment

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Component

Specification

Why it is specified this way

Zero-grazing units

Cubicle housing with concrete floors, adequate slope and drainage, roofed feed alley and separate calf pens

Poor housing design is a leading cause of mastitis and lameness, both of which destroy yield faster than any feed deficiency

Water

A borehole with elevated storage and reticulation to each stall

A lactating cow drinks 60 to 100 litres a day, and water restriction reduces milk yield faster than under-feeding

Milking

A small milking parlour with a bucket or pipeline milking machine, and stainless steel handling equipment

Hand milking a herd above about 20 cows becomes a labour and hygiene constraint. The herd passes that point in Year 2

Cooling

An on-farm cooling tank so that evening milk can be held and delivered chilled

Cooperatives increasingly pay on quality, and warm milk is rejected or discounted

Forage handling

Chaff cutter, silage bunkers to 250 tonnes, and a tractor or contracted mechanisation for land preparation and harvesting

The fodder block only delivers its KES 4.10m of value if the forage can actually be cut, chopped and conserved on time

Manure

Slurry channels and composting bays, with a biogas digester option to reduce energy costs

Housed animals allow near-complete manure capture; it returns to the fodder block and is sold to horticultural and tea growers

Capital expenditure at inception
Figure 14. Capital expenditure at inception.

6.1 Capital expenditure detail

Item

Amount (KES)

Depreciation life

Note

In-calf heifers, Year 1, 20 head

4 000 000

Not depreciated

At KES 200 000 per confirmed in-calf heifer

Zero-grazing housing and calf pens

2 800 000

20 years

Cubicle housing to 55-cow capacity, built in two phases

Water: borehole, storage and reticulation

1 200 000

15 years

Including WRA authorisation and pump

Forage equipment and mechanisation

1 100 000

8 years

Chaff cutter, implements, contracted tractor services

Milking parlour and machine

900 000

10 years

Bucket or pipeline system with stainless handling equipment

Milk cooling tank

900 000

10 years

Enables evening milk delivery and quality premiums

Feed store and silage bunkers

800 000

15 years

Approximately 250 tonne silage capacity

Fodder establishment, 12 acres

450 000

5 years

Land preparation, seed, cuttings, first fertiliser

Fencing, site works and services

400 000

15 years

Perimeter, internal roads, power connection

Manure handling and composting

350 000

10 years

Slurry channels, composting bays, biogas provision

Total capital expenditure at inception

12 900 000

Biological assets are carried at cost and are not depreciated; cull and surplus stock sales are taken to revenue as they arise. Depreciation of KES 742 500 a year is charged on the fixed assets only, over lives of five to twenty years. The heifers bought in Years 2 to 4 add a further KES 8 400 000 to the biological asset carrying value, taking it to KES 12 400 000 by Year 4.