Article summary: SPACE in Rennes (16–18 Sep 2025) is a useful “industry temperature check” for pasture-based farms. This article pulls out three themes that matter to graziers (efficiency, resilience, emissions), then turns each into practical on-farm decisions, simple measurements, and a next-week action. Pasture.io is the through-line: better measurement and planning improves utilisation, residual control, and reduces feed gaps.
SPACE in Rennes, France (16–18 September 2025) is one of those events where you can see, quickly, what the global livestock sector is leaning into and what it is moving away from.
If you run a pasture-based system, the opportunity is not to copy products. It’s to copy themes, then translate them into paddock-level actions you can measure.
Below are three themes worth taking home, without disappearing into policy or technology rabbit holes.
Theme 1: Efficiency, not intensity
What the sector is getting serious about
Efficiency that shows up in labour, feed use, and repeatability. Not “more inputs”, just fewer wasted decisions.
What it means on pasture
Most efficiency gains come from doing three basics well, more consistently:
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moving on time (not a day late)
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allocating cleanly (so you hit residuals)
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keeping the rotation steady (so you stop firefighting)
What to measure (keep it simple)
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Time per shift (minutes from “start move” to “done”)
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Residual hit-rate (how often you hit your intended post-graze)
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Feed gap days (days you fed unplanned supplement or broke the plan)
Do this next week
Pick one mob and track time per shift plus whether you hit your residual target for every move. One week of honest numbers will show you exactly where friction is costing you.
Pasture.io tie-in
When your feed wedge and paddock covers are up to date, “where next?” becomes quick and calm. That reduces second-guessing and helps you keep the rotation consistent, which is where efficiency compounds.
Theme 2: Resilience, built before you need it
What the sector is getting serious about
Systems that handle variability: wet spells, growth-rate swings, and sudden feed pressure, without wrecking the platform.
What it means on pasture
Resilience is mostly about protecting the pasture bank so you have options:
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slow the rotation early when you’re drifting below target
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use supplement to protect residuals (not to chase the farm down)
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have a wet-weather plan that concentrates damage (rather than spreading it)
What to measure
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Average cover trend (is your feed bank rising or falling week to week?)
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Growth vs demand (is the gap closing or widening?)
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Emergency decision count (how many “we had to…” moments this week)
Do this next week
Write down two triggers:
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“If growth drops below demand by X for two weeks, we slow rotation and add buffer feed.”
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“If conditions turn wet, these are the paddocks we protect and this is where we wear the damage.”
You’re not predicting the season, you’re pre-deciding your response.
Pasture.io tie-in
Growth vs demand is the early warning light. It tells you when you must slow down (or supplement) before covers collapse and you lose control of the rotation.
Theme 3: Emissions, treated as a business metric
What the sector is getting serious about
Lower emissions intensity, achieved through better efficiency and fewer losses, not through paperwork.
What it means on pasture
For most grazing farms, the biggest levers are the same levers that lift profit:
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reduce feed waste (better utilisation and fewer blown residuals)
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reduce performance dips (fewer feed gaps and abrupt diet changes)
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use nitrogen more efficiently (right place, right time, or more legume contribution)
What to measure
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Purchased feed per unit of output (a simple proxy for system efficiency)
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Nitrogen applied per hectare (and whether it produced usable growth)
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Days with disrupted performance (feed gaps, long wet spells, forced changes)
Do this next week
Baseline one thing: track feed gap days for the next month. It’s a surprisingly strong proxy for both profitability and emissions intensity because it captures how often the system is being forced off plan.
Pasture.io tie-in
Once you can see utilisation, residuals, average cover, and growth vs demand in one place, improvements stop being vague. You can measure whether you’re actually reducing feed gaps and tightening allocation, which is the practical route to lower emissions intensity.
The takeaway
SPACE is a global show, but the take-home for graziers is local and paddock-level: tighten the decision loop, protect the pasture bank, and measure a small set of efficiency and resilience indicators every week. The farms that do that make fewer emergency calls, and they build outcomes (production, welfare, emissions intensity) as a by-product of good grazing discipline.
- The Dedicated Team of Pasture.io, 2025-09-30