Rachel Martin: Honey I shrunk the farm; why the future of farming is micro

Precision farming is about to get micro-sized.

If there’s one thing I learned during my debut on the judging panel of the Innovation Awards at this year’s National Dairy Show, it’s that precision farming is about to get micro-sized - and by that, I mean a new focus on livestock microbiology.

From AHV's products which claim to disrupt the vesicles released by parasites to methane-reducing feed additives, which work by inhibiting methanogenic archaea, and even a mobile microscope allowing lab-quality parasite testing on-farm, it's clear that the importance of looking to the microbiology of the animal in order to drive productivity and performance is really about to take off.