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Animal health and welfare state and technical efficiency of dairy farms: possible synergies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2023

L Tremetsberger ,
C Winckler  and
J Kantelhardt
L Tremetsberger
Affiliation:
Division of Livestock Sciences, Department of Sustainable Agricultural Systems, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Gregor-Mendel-Strasse 33, 1180 Vienna, Austria
C Winckler
Affiliation:
Division of Livestock Sciences, Department of Sustainable Agricultural Systems, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Gregor-Mendel-Strasse 33, 1180 Vienna, Austria Contact for correspondence: christoph.winckler@boku.ac.at
J Kantelhardt
Affiliation:
Division of Agricultural and Forestry Economics, Department of Economics and Social Sciences, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Feistmantelstrasse 4, 1180 Vienna, Austria
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Abstract

This study sought to investigate whether animal health and welfare state and changes were associated with technical efficiency in a sample of 34 Austrian dairy farms. Health and welfare were assessed twice using the Welfare Quality® (WQ) assessment protocol for dairy cattle. Following a baseline welfare assessment, farm-specific health and welfare planning was conducted on the farms. This included the identification, selection and implementation of measures in housing and management that aimed at improving health and welfare states. One year after implementation, farms were reassessed to evaluate changes in health and welfare states and consequences for farms’ technical efficiency were analysed using the Malmquist index. Our results indicated that farms with a higher health state (WQ principle score ‘Good health’) achieved higher technical efficiencies. However, we could not show that changes in the welfare state within a one-year period affected technical efficiency: across all farms, technical efficiency remained stable and Malmquist indices (indicating efficiency and technological change) could not be explained by the different welfare scores. Nevertheless, our study showed data envelopment analysis to be a valuable method for analysing the relationship between animal welfare and farm success and our results indicate substantial potential synergies between these two aspects.

Keywords

animal welfaredairy cowsdata envelopment analysisMalmquist indexon-farm assessmentWelfare Quality®
Type
Articles
Information
Animal Welfare , Volume 28 , Issue 3 , August 2019 , pp. 345 - 352
Copyright
© 2019 Universities Federation for Animal Welfare

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