Feed mill planning tool
Feed Production Cost Per Metric Tonne 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?
Feed cost per metric tonne = delivered ingredients per tonne + variable conversion costs per tonne + annual fixed production costs divided by actual annual tonnes. A metric tonne is 1,000 kg, not a US short ton. Enter your own dated costs and realistic output; defaults are illustrative arithmetic inputs, not prices or industry benchmarks.
Reviewed 18 October 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
- Annual costs allocated per tonne (incl. thermal)
- USD 26.00
10.3% of total
Allocated annual costs rise per tonne when actual production falls; compare the breakdown rather than assuming a dominant cost.
- Source
- Calculated from the values you entered — no external price, nutrient or supplier database is used.
- Date
- Calculator reviewed 18 October 2026; result calculated now from your inputs
- Currency
- USD — money figures are in US dollars as entered
- Reliability
- Preliminary planning estimate — not a quotation, not a guarantee.
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% |
| Thermal energy | USD 0.00 | 0.0% |
| 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% |
| Sensitivity — Thermal energy +10% | +USD 0.00/t | +0.00% |
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 one-at-a-time input changes within this scenario, not guaranteed negotiation or investment returns.
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.
- Annual thermal energy (not in overhead) (USD/yr)
- Your fuel/steam cost for this output basis; zero excludes thermal energy, not evidence of zero consumption.
- 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)
- Product-conditioned accepted output; use the same species, recipe, moisture and reject basis as your costs.
- 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
Annual labour, maintenance, depreciation, overhead and entered thermal-energy spend are allocated over actual annual tonnage = product-conditioned t/h × hours per day × days per year × utilisation. Electricity, packaging and additives are applied per tonne directly. Thermal energy must not also appear in overhead. Sensitivity increases one input 10 percent at a time; utilisation is capped at 100 percent.
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.
- All t units mean metric tonnes (1,000 kg); h means hours and yr means year. Keep all monetary inputs in USD, converting dated quotes explicitly if needed.
- Thermal energy uses your annual fuel/steam cost allocated to the same accepted output; exclude it from overhead to avoid double counting.
- Additives are entered only when excluded from the raw-material formula cost. Defaults are examples, never market data.
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.
Sources and data
- Inputs: every number comes from what you enter. Default values are illustrative only, not market data.
- Method: the arithmetic described under "Methodology" above, applied to your inputs. No external price, nutrient or supplier database is used.
- Last reviewed: 18 October 2026, by FeedMatch Group.
What can change the result?
- · Animal numbers and cycle length
- · Intake curve and stage split
- · Mortality, waste and shrinkage allowance
- · Feed price per tonne
- · Season, climate and management effects
AI agents may use FeedMatch calculators to structure preliminary feed requirements and RFQs. Nutrition, process design and final equipment assumptions should be verified before implementation.
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?
Related tools
Equipment and market context
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.