The implementing team of Community Service to the Community Partnership Program or Program Kemitraan Masyarakat (PKM) scheme of Universitas Pendidikan Ganesha (Undiksha) and Universitas Udayana collaborated to train and assist Bali Sari Home Industry, Sepang Village, Busungbiu District, Buleleng Regency to produce bio-fermented animal feed. The implementation of this activity is within the framework of providing sustainable feed as well as an effort to preserve forage feed sources.
Bali Sari Home Industry is a business group in skin care product production using goat milk and herbal extracts as the main mixture. In fulfilling animal feed, it becomes crucial for ruminant farmers because feed availability is not continuous. Especially during the dry season, farmers have difficulty finding forage feed. On the other hand, when green fodder is abundant, farmers are busy picking the coffee harvest, which is the main commodity of farmers in Sepang Village.
This gap made the PKM team from two state universities in Bali try to initiate a solution by training farmers to process green feed by bio-fermentation into silage that can be stored and given to ruminants at any time.
The head of the PKM implementation team, Dr. I Dewa Ketut Sastrawidana, M.Si, Tuesday (26/9/2022), said that this activity is upstream of efforts to increase the creative economy of goat milk-based skin care products whose implementation has started from July 10, 2022. This PKM begins with training and assistance in making local microorganisms, making bio-fermentation animal feed / Silage, which is then carried out with assistance in improving the packaging of skin care products produced by Bali Sari on September 25, 2022.
In principle, explained the Chemistry academic, animal feed in the form of silage is made from a mixture of forage feed added with concentrates that can be in the form of rice bran or corn and added a little mineral such as salt and urea, which is fermented anaerobically using microorganisms, especially lactic acid bacteria. “This fermentation process generally lasts for about three weeks which is carried out in a silo or plastic tonk with a cover,” he explained.
Unud academics in the field of agricultural technology as well as PKM implementing members, Dr. I Putu Surya Wirawan, M.Si, added the advantages of silage, including fiber content in fresh forage feed is generally dominated by lignocellulose components (complex carbohydrates) which are difficult for livestock to digest, so that through the fermentation process it can increase livestock digestibility, can meet the needs of 70 to 90 percent of livestock nutritional needs and its nutritional value is quite stable even though it is stored for a long period.
This 2022 community partnership program is a community service grant funded by the Directorate General of Higher Education, Research and Technology, Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology. (rls/hms)
