Follow a field or herd's costs

A farm’s costs belong to the field or herd that used them: the dairy meal to the milking herd, the fertiliser to the potato field. Kila keeps each field, herd or house as a cost centre: “Inputs to a cost centre (seed, fertiliser, feed, a vet visit) are kept against it and taken into the cost of its next harvest or births. Sales of the batches it produced count towards it.”

Steps

1. Open Cost centres

   On Production orders, open the Cost centres tab. Each field, herd or house shows its Inputs, the inputs Not yet in a harvest, its Production, its Sales and Sales less costs, with how many orders it has had and what they made.

2. Tap Record input on the field or herd

   Kila opens Input to the cost centre, such as Input to Milking herd: “From stock (it leaves stock at its cost), or a cost with no stock item.”

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   Steps 2 to 4 on one screen.

   

3. Choose from stock, or give the cost

   For feed, seed or medicine from your store, search under From stock: seed, fertiliser, feed … and type the quantity: it leaves stock at its cost. For anything else, such as ploughing or a vet’s visit, type What it was and its Cost.

4. Tap Record

   Kila says Input recorded, with what it was and its cost.

5. Read the cost centre

   The field or herd’s Inputs go up, and so does Not yet in a harvest: the inputs waiting to go into the cost of its next harvest or births.

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Inputs to a field’s season

A field also keeps its seasons. On Fields, herds and milk, the Fields and seasons tab shows each season’s Crop, Area, Inputs, Harvested, Yield and Harvest from. Tap Input on a season to record what went into that crop: “From stock, or a cost with no stock item (ploughing, labour). A spray’s pre-harvest interval holds the harvest.”

1. Choose the Activity: Planting, Fertilising, Spraying, Weeding, Irrigation, Labour or Other.
2. Choose the product From stock, or type What it was and its Cost. For Spraying, type the Pre-harvest interval in days, or leave it: “Missing: the product’s withdrawal period.”
3. Tap Save. Kila says Input recorded. After a spray, the season’s Harvest from shows the day the interval ends.

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What if

The name is already used

Kila shows:

There is already a cost centre called Milking herd.

Each cost centre needs its own name. Add a cost centre asks for a Name, such as “Field 3, Dairy herd, House B”, its Kind and the farm.

Harvest has no product to offer

Harvest on a field or herd opens Plan a production order with the field or herd as its Cost centre: “A harvest or births from a field or herd take its inputs into their cost.” The dialog offers only products with a recipe or parts list. Kinangop Dairy Farm has none, so when this page was checked its harvests could not be planned from this screen.

Needs a manager

On Cost centres, recording inputs and harvests is for people who plan production, such as the farm manager. On Fields, herds and milk, anyone who records the farm’s work, such as a herdsman, can add a season’s inputs. The owner switches cost centres on under Cost centres (fields, herds, houses) in the production settings, and chooses whether inputs go into the next harvest or births.

Related

• Record a milking: milk goes into stock on the milking herd.
• Farm manager: the farm manager’s day.
• Production: how Kila works for farms and factories.

Next: record the day’s milk: Record a milking.