Development of a Cost-Optimal Nutritionally Balanced Homemade Canine Diet through Linear Programming

Abstract

The following work aims to propose a linear programming model to optimize the cost of preparing a homemade diet for dogs, using ingredients available in the local markets, always trying to maintain the animal’s nutritional requirements. The creation of the diet comes from the need of having a high-quality pet diet at a low cost, since consumers tend to perceive the meal’s price at a same standard as its price. Two different energy densities and fat variations were used to obtain the resulting recipes, of which the high fat diet yielded a nutrient composition of 28.23% crude protein, 20.60% fat, 4.61% dietary fiber, 3.03% ash, 0.63% calcium, 0.535% phosphorus, and 0.095% sodium. The low-fat diet yielded a composition of 30.96% crude protein, 17.03% fat, 4.49% fiber, 2.98% ash, 0.62% calcium, 0.93% phosphorus, and 0.093% sodium. The cost obtained for each of the diets was L.4.57 per 78.98 grams (L.26.25/lb.) and L.20.05 per 322.97 grams (L.28.18/lb.) respectively.