Meta-analysis of the effect of essential oil usage towards the production and milk composition of dairy cow

Abstract

One of the strategies to increase dairy cow production is by using antibiotics to manipulate the rumen fermentation process; nevertheless, there has been a ban on antibiotics usage in Europe and Indonesia. Essential oils consist of many secondary metabolites that own anti-microbes characteristics as antibiotics. This study aims at evaluating the effect of essential oil dosage on feed efficiency and dairy cow production by the meta-analysis method. There are two data types, namely rumen fermentation and in vivo production performance of milking cows based on the independent variable. The variable is in the form of essential oils dosage taken from thirteen journals from previous studies conducted from the year 2013 to 2020. The result of the meta-analysis analysis shows that the dosage of essential oil only has any impact on the population of protozoa. On the other hand, it does not have any effect on the fermentation result such as pH, methane, volatile fatty acids, and ammonia. The usage of a specific dosage of essential oils has significant impacts on milk production, fat corrected milk (FCM), and feed efficiency. Still, it does not impact the milk composition parameters such as lactose, fat, protein and milk urea nitrogen (MUN). The result of the study concluded that the usage of a specific dosage of essential oils has significant impacts on milk production, protozoa, and fat corrected milk.