CERES TAG on-ear sensors were used to monitor individual animals during the recent Great Australian Charity Cattle Drive.
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CERES TAG’s innovative technology is helping producers make data-informed decisions, one on-ear sensor at a time.
CERES TAG on-ear sensors were used to monitor individual animals during the recent Great Australian Charity Cattle Drive.
Brisbane ag tech company CERES TAG’s latest partnership, with a major research agency in Texas, will see its on-ear sensors used in university programs across the state. It’s testament to how far the business’s global innovation has come since the product’s launch at Beef 2021 in Rockhampton. In those four years, CERES TAG sensors have been trialled on vast properties across the Gulf, incorporated into tertiary training across the United States and enlisted by animal researchers, including a Smithsonian team in Montana, which uses the product to track wild bison.
This Queensland-based company is revolutionising how farmers globally manage livestock, proving that Australian ag tech can compete on the world stage. “We went global from day one of our launch and because of that, it’s kind of made us think big, and that’s a really powerful thing to do,” says Melita Smith, who co-founded the company with her husband, David, an engineer. “The rest of the world is excited by the development coming out of Australia. We’re doing amazing things as a country right now and as an industry, in animal health and ag tech.”
Now available in 40 countries, CERES TAG is the world’s first direct-to-satellite animal monitoring information platform. The company’s solar-powered on-ear sensors help producers make data-informed decisions when it comes to breeding, stocking rates and animal welfare. They track the walking, grazing and ruminating times of each animal, which can then be analysed via software to provide insights such as feed conversion efficiency, pasture quality and potential risks (unusual behaviour triggers a phone alert).
CERES TAG aims to boost profitability in the beef industry to ensure the legacy of the drover lives on.
Patchy wi-fi is no barrier, because the tags use satellites to share information. Language is no obstacle either, as the data can be shared with a range of third-party software programs, whether they happen to be in Japanese or Spanish. The United States is a major market — no surprise given the country’s vast cattle ranches — as is Switzerland, where farmers release their cattle into the alps to graze over the summer.
The Smiths worked with the CSIRO to develop the on-ear sensors, with funding from Meat and Livestock Australia. They are unapologetically global in their ambitions yet they also want to ensure local communities benefit from their technology. In Australia, the company has moved away from its initial ecommerce model and now sells its products off the shelf at ag stores around the country.
CERES TAG co-founders David and Melita Smith.
A herd is fitted out with CERES TAG on-ear sensors.
“You going in and spending money at your local store really matters to us,” says Melita, a former teacher who was raised on a property in Queensland’s South Burnett region. “I grew up in a rural town; there were 15 kids in my Year 12 class and I loved growing up like that. If businesses and people like us don’t allow commerce to happen in those small towns, then you lose your kindy and your primary school.”
CERES TAG sensors were put to work, fittingly enough for this technology that has been informed by the knowledge and tradition of the drover, on the recent Great Australian Charity Cattle Drive, which saw almost 1700 head travel from Longreach to Roma, Queensland. The company provided at-home spectators with real-time information throughout the 500 kilometre journey, including the animals’ pasture feed intake, estimated methane emissions and welfare alerts (or lack thereof — no adverse alerts were recorded).
Almost 1700 head travelled from Longreach to Roma, Queensland, on The Great Australian Charity Cattle Drive.
“It just reflected what the people on the drive said,” explains Melita. “They knew the animals were well, that they hadn’t had a cattle rush and that the dogs hadn’t got in there. But we can show there were no alerts of behaviour change to back that story up.” She says many users turn to CERES TAG for this kind of data, which is becoming increasingly important to those further down the supply chain, particularly importers of Australian beef.
At the end of the day, Melita says she and David want to make sure beef production is profitable for the next generation of growers, here and abroad. “Technology is bringing profitability and production gains back into the industry,” she says. “And that’s what our technology is about. It’s about upholding the legacy of the cattleman in every country, whether it’s the UK, where they’ve got their wellingtons and big shepherd’s crook, or the cowboy in the US with his chaps and spurs, or in Australia with the legacy of the drover and the cattlemen. We don’t want to be replacing the farmer in any way, but we do want to make their lives easier and make their farms more profitable so that legacy can live on.”
To find out more about the CERES TAG range, go to cerestag.com.
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