The chemical composition and in vitro dry matter digestibility of a number of forages, namely lucerne (Medicago sativa), Italian rye grass (Lolium multiflorum), triticale (Triticale hexaploide), oats (Avena sativa), tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea), babala (Penniseturn typhoides), forage sorghum (Sorghum bicolour sudanense), weeping lovegrass (Eragrostis curvula), Smuts finger (Digitaria eriantha) and maize (Zea mays) residues, were predicted by a Neotec model 51A near infrared reflectance spectrophotometer. The r2 values (where r is the simple coefficient of correlation) between laboratory determined and near infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS) predicted values for the different forages ranged between 0.92-0.96 for crude protein (CP), 0.65 -0.97 for in vitro dry matter digestibility (IVDMD), 0.75-80.95 for acid detergent fibre (ADD and between 0.34-0.87 for neutral detergent fibre (NDF). Standard errors for NIRS prediction of the chemical components and IVDMD of the different forages ranged between 0.57-1.78% for CP, 1.37-3.82% for IVDMD, 1.11-2.17% for ADF and 1.90 -4.47% for NDF.