Feed mill planning tool
Feed Production Cost Per Ton Calculator
Calculate total feed cost per tonne from raw material, electricity, labour, maintenance, packaging, additives and depreciation — then see which input moves your cost most.
How much does it cost to produce one tonne of animal feed?
Total cost per tonne is the raw-material cost of the formula plus the conversion cost of running the plant. Ingredients normally account for 70 to 85 percent of the total. Conversion cost — electricity, labour, maintenance, packaging, depreciation and overhead — commonly falls between USD 9 and USD 30 per tonne, driven far more by utilisation than by any single line item, because fixed costs are spread over whatever tonnage the plant actually produces.
Reviewed August 2026. Planning estimate — not a quotation.
Run the numbers
Result
- Total cost per tonne
- USD 379.02
- Cost per kilogram
- USD 0.379
- Conversion cost per tonne
- USD 39.02
- Raw-material share
- 89.7%
- Actual annual production
- 56,160 t
- Annual production cost
- USD 21,285,603
- Fixed cost carried per tonne
- USD 26.00
10.3% of total
Cost breakdown and sensitivity
| Item | USD/t | Share of total |
|---|---|---|
| Raw material | USD 340.00 | 89.7% |
| Electricity | USD 3.52 | 0.9% |
| Additives / premix | USD 6.00 | 1.6% |
| Packaging | USD 3.50 | 0.9% |
| Labour | USD 7.48 | 2.0% |
| Maintenance & spares | USD 4.63 | 1.2% |
| Depreciation | USD 10.68 | 2.8% |
| Overhead | USD 3.21 | 0.8% |
| Sensitivity — Raw material +10% | +USD 34.00/t | +8.97% |
| Sensitivity — Utilisation +10% (relative) | USD -2.36/t | -0.62% |
| Sensitivity — Labour +10% | +USD 0.75/t | +0.20% |
| Sensitivity — Maintenance +10% | +USD 0.46/t | +0.12% |
| Sensitivity — Electricity tariff +10% | +USD 0.35/t | +0.09% |
| Sensitivity — Specific energy +10% | +USD 0.35/t | +0.09% |
Your inputs travel with the request so you never retype them. Nothing is sent until you review and submit the RFQ yourself.
What this tool calculates
- Splits cost per tonne into raw material and conversion cost, with the full line-item breakdown and each item's share.
- Applies your real utilisation so fixed costs land on actual tonnes, not nameplate tonnes.
- Runs a sensitivity pass showing what happens to cost per tonne when each major input moves 10 percent.
- Reports cost per kilogram and total annual production cost.
- Ranks the inputs by influence so you know where negotiation or investment actually pays.
What it cannot do
- It does not formulate the ration or check nutritional adequacy — it costs the formula you enter.
- It does not source ingredient prices; you supply the delivered price you actually pay.
- It excludes distribution to farm, financing cost and taxation.
- It is not a management-accounting system and will not reconcile to audited statements.
Who this is for
- Feed manufacturers benchmarking their own conversion cost
- Integrators deciding between buying compound feed and producing in-house
- Investors testing whether a planned plant is viable at realistic utilisation
- Procurement teams challenging a toll-milling or supply quotation
Input definitions
- Raw-material cost of the formula (USD/t)
- Weighted delivered cost of the finished ration.
- Electricity consumption (kWh/t)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 32 kWh/t.
- Electricity tariff (USD/kWh)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 0.11 USD/kWh.
- Additives / premix not in raw material (USD/t)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 6 USD/t.
- Packaging (USD/t)
- Enter 0 for pure bulk loadout.
- Annual labour cost (USD/yr)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 420000 USD/yr.
- Annual maintenance & spare parts (USD/yr)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 260000 USD/yr.
- Annual overhead (USD/yr)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 180000 USD/yr.
- Depreciable CAPEX (USD)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 9000000 USD.
- Depreciation period (years)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 15 years.
- Rated throughput (t/h)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 15 t/h.
- Operating hours per day (h)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 16 h.
- Operating days per year (d)
- Entered by you. Default used for the worked example: 300 d.
- Utilisation (%)
- Share of scheduled capacity genuinely produced.
Methodology
Fixed annual cost (labour, maintenance, depreciation, overhead) is divided by actual annual tonnage, where actual tonnage = rated t/h × hours per day × days per year × utilisation. Variable costs (electricity, packaging, additives) are applied per tonne directly. Total cost per tonne = raw material + variable conversion + fixed conversion. Sensitivity is run by increasing each input 10 percent in isolation and recording the change in total cost per tonne.
Assumptions
- Raw-material cost is entered as the weighted delivered cost of the finished formula, including shrinkage.
- Electricity is entered as specific consumption in kWh per tonne multiplied by tariff, covering the whole plant.
- Depreciation is straight-line over the entered asset life with no residual value.
- Overhead covers administration, insurance, laboratory and site costs not captured elsewhere.
- No allowance is made for waste beyond the shrinkage embedded in your raw-material figure.
Worked example — 15 t/h broiler pellet plant
Inputs
- Raw material USD 340/t, electricity 32 kWh/t at USD 0.11/kWh, additives USD 6/t, packaging USD 3.50/t
- Labour USD 420,000/year, maintenance USD 260,000/year, overhead USD 180,000/year
- CAPEX USD 9,000,000 over 15 years, 15 t/h, 16 h/day, 300 days, 78 percent utilisation
Outputs
- Actual production about 56,160 t/year
- Conversion cost about USD 34/t
- Total cost about USD 374/t, or USD 0.374/kg
- Raw material is roughly 91 percent of total cost
How to read it. A 10 percent raw-material move shifts total cost by about USD 34 per tonne. A 10 percent electricity move shifts it by about USD 0.35. That is the whole argument for spending negotiating effort on ingredient contracts before energy contracts — but note that conversion cost is where a badly utilised plant bleeds, since utilisation falling from 78 to 60 percent adds roughly USD 8 per tonne on its own.
Limitations
- Conversion cost varies widely by country, capacity and product mix. Use your own figures rather than the defaults for any decision.
- Sensitivity is one-at-a-time; real markets move several inputs together, and correlated moves can be larger than the sum shown here.
- Ranges are planning estimates for budgeting, not quotations or guarantees.
All figures are indicative planning estimates for budgeting and supplier discussion. They are not quotations, guarantees or professional engineering, nutritional, legal or financial advice. Have results reviewed by the responsible professionals before you commit capital.
Frequently asked questions
What is the biggest cost in animal feed production?
What is a normal conversion cost for a feed mill?
How does utilisation change cost per tonne?
Should I include depreciation in cost per tonne?
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Turn the result into comparable quotations
FeedMatch Group is a supplier-neutral B2B procurement platform. Describe the requirement once and we qualify relevant manufacturers and suppliers, normalise offers to the same battery limits and guarantees, and return a like-for-like comparison. FeedMatch does not manufacture feed or feed-mill machinery.