Precision livestock tools to improve products and processes in broiler production: a review

Economic growth and production process development require technological support. Technology changes production functions, enabling a higher number of goods to be produced using the same amount of input. In this review, we discuss research and development in information technology that has led to innovative actions, with the new generation of tools, known as precision agriculture tools, that can be applied in Brazilian poultry production. In this context, research and development have focused on producing technological innovations based on increasingly specialized tools that go beyond human mind power, and are related to the acquisition, access, and processing of a huge number of data. The technology generated to date has assimilated the knowledge of experts, transferring it to the computing environment, providing steady, consistent, inexpensive, and fast tools to support decision-making in corporate farms. This will produce more precise and documented decisions, based on accessible and reproducible knowledge. There would be no direct interference of the global market, bringing benefits to producers, consumers, and also ensuring the welfare of birds. This review also highlights the interest of researcher in developing intelligent applications to support best practices, methods, and processes in order to monitor the production chain. It also shows that a few changes may affect the process as a whole, enabling fast decision-making, and promoting a preventative and less aggressive management of birds.