TECHNOLOGY 88 FEED & ADDITIVE MAGAZINE July 2025 SMART MONITORING IN FEED PRODUCTION: A NEW ERA OF SAFETY AND SUSTAINABILITY Barry Finnegan CEO and Co-Founder LvLogics Smart monitoring in feed production is transforming how facilities manage safety, efficiency, and sustainability. As manual inspections give way to real-time digital visibility, innovative systems like SiloSpi reduce waste, improve worker safety, and enhance environmental performance. With growing demands and stricter goals, smart technologies are becoming essential tools in the evolution of modern feed mills. Like all others worldwide, the animal nutrition industry faces two fundamental challenges, how to meet growing global demand without compromising worker safety, and how to achieve that without damaging the planet. In wrestling with this challenge, a technological revolution is quietly transforming how feed storage facilities manage their most fundamental resource: inventory. THE NUMBERS TELL THE STORY Animal agriculture, which heavily depends on feed crops, is responsible for about 14.5% of all humancaused greenhouse gas emissions globally.1 In the United States, livestock farms generate approximately 70% of the nation’s ammonia emissions, which contribute to air pollution and climate change, particularly through methane production.2 The American Feed Industry Association (AFIA) and the U.S. dairy industry have set goals to reduce the carbon footprint of animal agriculture, aiming for carbon neutrality, optimized water use, and improved nutrient management by 2050. When it comes to worker safety, falls from grain or raw material bins are the second most common cause of injury or death worldwide after entrapments. However, as there are no comprehensive or mandatory incident or injury reporting systems for most of agriculture, many incidents are thought to go unreported. From 2005 to 2015, the U.S. averaged 35 incidents annually, with 60%–70% fatalities, though falls were not separately categorized.3 Even with improved safety protocols in place, manual inspections remain inherently dangerous. Then there’s waste. Currently, over $2 billion is wasted globally each year due to inefficient animal feed delivery. FROM DANGER ZONES TO DIGITAL VISIBILITY: THE EVOLUTION OF FEED STORAGE MONITORING Smart monitoring systems are changing the game, replacing dangerous manual practices with da-
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