Use of a Whole Farm Model for Exploring Management Decisions in Dairying

challenges to both farmers and researchers. Farmers want to increase production, reduce costs and remain profitable under variable climatic and economic conditions. Researchers want to understand and keep track of the complex biological interactions on a farm, integrate this with economic variables, and give sound management advice. The Whole Farm Model (WFM) is a VisualAge Smalltalk (IBM) framework, linking sub-models of pasture growth and cow metabolism written in different languages, and designed to simulate the complex interactions of climate, pasture, animals and management on a farm. The model was specifically designed to extend farmlet trial result