Increasing Grazing in Dairy Cow Milk Production Systems in Europe

Deirdre Hennessy,Agnes Van Den Pol-Van Dasselaar,Luc Delaby,Laurence Shalloo

doi:10.3390/su12062443

Abstract

In temperate regions of Europe where grass grows for most of the year, grazed pasture is the lowest cost feed for milk production. Grazed pasture can make a contribution to dairy cow feeding systems in other parts of Europe, but is less important. While there are many challenges to maintaining or increasing the proportion of grazed grass in dairy cow diets, there are also opportunities to increase its contribution. Grass use and quality can be challenging for several reasons, including the cow and sward interaction, and factors influencing dry matter intake. Adapting grazing management strategies can provide opportunities for incorporating grazing and perhaps increase grazing in dairy cow milk production systems. Pasture management tools and techniques offer the opportunity to increase herbage use at grazing. While there are many benefits of grazing including economic, environmental, animal welfare and social, there are also the challenges to maintaining grazed pasture in dairy cow diets. The objective of this paper is to present an overview of the challenges and opportunities for grazing in dairy milk production systems.

Highlights

While there is an increasing demand for food production globally as population size increases [1], it is imperative that an increase in food production takes place in a sustainable manner to minimise the environmental impact
Across Europe, the proportion of grazed grass in dairy cow diets is declining as production systems intensify [6,7], despite the benefits of grazing
The availability of labour, calving pattern, use of high genetic merit cows, increasing number of cows per farm and land fragmentation are some of the reasons for the decline in grazing

Summary

Introduction

While there is an increasing demand for food production globally as population size increases [1], it is imperative that an increase in food production takes place in a sustainable manner to minimise the environmental impact. In temperate regions pasture-based dairy cow milk production systems make use of a human inedible feed source, grass, and convert it to human edible food, especially protein-based in the form of milk and meat. Increased demand for food and feed, drought and environmental considerations mean that self-sufficient farming systems will likely become more important in the future. Such systems should be based on local or on-farm produced feed [3]. Challenges include infrastructural constraints such as facilities, farm fragmentation, farm size and mechanization, and cultural constraints such as cow type, pasture management skills, government policy (EU and local) and milk price. Grazing systems are associated with opportunities for greater global sustainability, increased product quality, improved animal welfare, and increased labour efficiency [8]

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Conclusion