A decision tool for maize silage harvest operations

In forage harvesting, self-propelled harvesters (SPFHs) are the component that most affects the cost of the process because of their high operating costs. Therefore efficient management of the SFPH is essential. There are basically two ways to improve the SPFH performance: to reduce the travelling distance between fields and to design an efficient planning for the transport vehicles. A decision support tool has been developed for silage harvest operations to help farm managers, consultants, and technicians decide which resources they should use to minimise the cost of harvesting operations. The focus is on searching the routes that provide reduced travelling distances for the SPFH by prioritising the harvesting starting date for each farmer, and matching the SPFH and number of trucks to minimise the total cost of the maize silage harvesting cycle. The developed decision support system is compared to a real scenario in a maize harvesting season. Results show that by using the decision support tool, savings of over 15% can be obtained in distances travelled when compared with manual scheduling. Savings over 20% could be made if the restriction of using the starting harvesting dates requested by the farmers was relaxed. Under the conditions tested, if tolerance levels are not considered, the harvesting system is more sensitive to selecting correct transport management approach than to the efficient management of SPFH routes.