Agro processing & mills
Inventory software for rice mills
Know how many quintals of paddy are in each warehouse, how much rice is bagged and ready, and what the bran pile is worth, without walking the yard.
In short
SimpleERP is inventory software for rice mills. Paddy arrives on supplier bills, rice leaves on invoices, bran and husk enter by adjustment, and every warehouse's stock is valued at weighted average cost from posted documents.
Illustration of stock on hand by warehouse at average cost, with a low-stock row highlighted and a movement ledger.
An inventory day at Volta Valley Rice Mill
Harvest week at Volta Valley Rice Mill means three warehouses filling at once. The main warehouse beside the huller takes fresh paddy from farmers around Aveyime, the second holds dried paddy waiting for the boiler, and a rented warehouse on the Accra road keeps bagged rice for the wholesale trade.
The questions come from every side. The owner wants to know if there is paddy for ten more days of milling, a trader asks for 300 bags of boiled rice by Thursday, the accountant wants the closing stock value, and the bran heap has never been on any register.
In SimpleERP nobody overwrites a quantity. A supplier bill adds paddy to a named warehouse, a work order turns it into rice, an invoice takes rice out and a transfer moves it between warehouses, each at weighted average cost, with a movement ledger that explains every figure.
Which units should paddy, rice and bran be kept in?
Pick the unit you count in, because each product has one. Most mills keep paddy in kilograms from the weighbridge slip, bagged rice in bags and husk in tonnes, and the table shows the pattern Volta Valley follows.
- Kilograms with three decimals are seeded at sign-up.
- Bag, quintal and tonne are units you add once in settings.
- A warehouse on every document line, so a bill names where the paddy went.
- Opening stock per warehouse comes in with the product CSV import.
| Product | Unit | Warehouse | Reorder level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paddy (long grain) | kg | Main warehouse | 60,000 kg |
| Paddy, dried for parboiling | kg | Drying warehouse | 20,000 kg |
| Boiled rice, 25 kg bags | bags | Accra road warehouse | 400 bags |
| Raw rice, loose | quintal | Main warehouse | 50 quintal |
| Broken rice | quintal | Main warehouse | None |
| Rice bran | kg | Main warehouse | None |
| Husk | tonne | Husk yard | None |
How do I know when paddy is running low?
Set a reorder level on each paddy product. When the stock in hand drops to it, the paddy appears on the low-stock list with the shortfall and the farmer or commission agent you last bought from, and you decide whether to buy more.
- Create purchase order from ticked rows, one draft per supplier.
- Shortfall in your own unit, kilos for paddy and bags for packed rice.
- Stock on hand per warehouse, so an empty drying warehouse is not hidden by a full main one.
- The decision stays yours: nothing is ordered on its own.
Where do bran and husk come from on the stock register?
A milling work order produces one output, the rice. Bran, broken rice and husk enter stock through an adjustment with the reason Other, a value per kilo and a note naming the run, and from then on they are sold and counted like any other product.
- Paddy consumed leaves the drying warehouse at its average cost when the work order completes.
- Rice received lands at the actual cost of the run.
- By-products at a value you choose, such as $0.20 per kg for bran.
Illustration of a bill of materials with cost roll-up and a work order moving from planned to in progress to completed.
Does the register match a physical count after the season?
Count mode lets the warehouse keeper enter what is really on the floor. SimpleERP posts the difference as an adjustment with a reason, so drying loss, rat damage or a miscount is recorded once and the stock value in the books moves with it.
- Transfers between warehouses at cost, with a document number for each truck moved.
- Movement ledger per product links to every bill, invoice, work order and count.
- Stock value by warehouse at weighted average cost for the month-end figure.
- CSV export of the stock list for the bank's stock report.
One system
Where inventory connects
Stock moves only when a paddy bill, a milling work order, a count, a transfer or a rice invoice posts, and the inventory account moves with it.
Agro processing & mills
Paddy and grain purchases by weight, milling runs at actual cost, and stock in kilos across warehouses.
See howInvoicing & tax
Tax invoices with VAT, GST or sales tax on every line, numbered by fiscal year and posted in one step.
See howAccounting for rice mills
Farmers' payables, traders' dues, power and loading, and stock value in one ledger that posts itself.
See howPayroll for rice mills
Day and night shift attendance, deductions and advances for mill hands, and the wage journal posted after one approval.
See howManufacturing for rice mills
A bill of materials from paddy to rice, a work order per milling run, and the real cost per kilo from actual yield.
See howInventory
Stock on hand by warehouse at weighted average cost, with a movement ledger and a low-stock list.
See how
Honest limits
What SimpleERP does not do yet
- No batch, lot, serial or expiry tracking, and no barcode scanning
- Weighted average cost only; there is no FIFO
- No automatic reorder suggestions: the reorder level shows what is low, you decide what to buy
- Drying loss is not tracked on its own; record it with a count after drying.
- No weighbridge integration: the net weight is typed from the slip.
Getting started
Start with inventory
Sign up with your email
Name, email and a password. No card for the seven-day trial.
Tell us about the business
Pick your country and, if you are registered, type your tax number. Accounts, tax rates, units, roles and numbering are seeded for that country.
Add products and opening stock
Import paddy, rice, broken rice, bran and husk with their units and opening stock per warehouse from a CSV file.
Post a bill and an invoice
Stock rises on the purchase bill and falls on the invoice, at weighted average cost, with nothing to count by hand.
FAQ
Questions, answered
Can I keep paddy in quintals and still use kilos from the weighbridge slip?
Choose one. A product has one unit, so if paddy is kept in quintals, type 48.625 quintals for a 4,862.5 kg slip; three decimals are allowed. Most mills keep paddy in kilos because the slip, the farmer's bill and the work order then use the same figure.
Is each farmer's paddy tracked as a separate lot?
No. SimpleERP has no batch or lot tracking, so paddy is counted by product and warehouse. If a variety matters, such as a long grain against a coarse variety, make each variety its own product and its stock and average cost stay separate.
How is my closing stock valued for the bank?
Quantities are kept per warehouse and each product carries one weighted average cost across the business, from posted bills, work orders, adjustments and invoices. Export the stock list as CSV on the last day of the month and the quantities and values are ready for the report your bank asks for against the line of credit.
Can my warehouse keeper move rice to the rented warehouse without seeing the accounts?
Yes. Give the keeper the Purchase & Inventory role. They can post transfers, counts and supplier bills, while payroll and the ledger stay hidden. Each transfer prints with its own number for the truck driver.
Related
Keep reading
Agro processing & mills
Paddy and grain purchases by weight, milling runs at actual cost, and stock in kilos across warehouses.
Read moreManufacturing for rice mills
A bill of materials from paddy to rice, a work order per milling run, and the real cost per kilo from actual yield.
Read moreInvoicing & tax
Tax invoices with VAT, GST or sales tax on every line, numbered by fiscal year and posted in one step.
Read more
See how inventory works in SimpleERP for agro processing and mills
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