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Determining the economic value of daily dry matter intake and associated methane emissions in dairy cattle

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 July 2019

C. M. Richardson Open the ORCID record for C. M. Richardson [Opens in a new window] ,
C. F. Baes ,
P. R. Amer ,
C. Quinton ,
P. Martin ,
V. R. Osborne ,
J. E. Pryce  and
F. Miglior
C. M. Richardson*
Affiliation:
Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1Canada
C. F. Baes
Affiliation:
Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1Canada
P. R. Amer
Affiliation:
AbacusBio Limited, PO Box 5585, Dunedin, New Zealand
C. Quinton
Affiliation:
AbacusBio Limited, PO Box 5585, Dunedin, New Zealand
P. Martin
Affiliation:
Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1Canada
V. R. Osborne
Affiliation:
Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1Canada
J. E. Pryce
Affiliation:
Agriculture Victoria, AgriBio, Centre for AgriBioscience, 5 Ring Road, Bundoora, Victoria 3083, Australia School of Applied Systems Biology, La Trobe University, 5 Ring Road, Bundoora, Victoria 3083, Australia
F. Miglior
Affiliation:
Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1Canada Canadian Dairy Network, 660 Speedvale Avenue West, Guelph, ON, N1K 1E5, Canada
*
†E-mail: caeli@uoguelph.ca
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Abstract

Feed represents a substantial proportion of production costs in the dairy industry and is a useful target for improving overall system efficiency and sustainability. The objective of this study was to develop methodology to estimate the economic value for a feed efficiency trait and the associated methane production relevant to Canada. The approach quantifies the level of economic savings achieved by selecting animals that convert consumed feed into product while minimizing the feed energy used for inefficient metabolism, maintenance and digestion. We define a selection criterion trait called Feed Performance (FP) as a 1 kg increase in more efficiently used feed in a first parity lactating cow. The impact of a change in this trait on the total lifetime value of more efficiently used feed via correlated selection responses in other life stages is then quantified. The resulting improved conversion of feed was also applied to determine the resulting reduction in output of emissions (and their relative value based on a national emissions value) under an assumption of constant methane yield, where methane yield is defined as kg methane/kg dry matter intake (DMI). Overall, increasing the FP estimated breeding value by one unit (i.e. 1 kg of more efficiently converted DMI during the cow’s first lactation) translates to a total lifetime saving of 3.23 kg in DMI and 0.055 kg in methane with the economic values of CAD $0.82 and CAD $0.07, respectively. Therefore, the estimated total economic value for FP is CAD $0.89/unit. The proposed model is robust and could also be applied to determine the economic value for feed efficiency traits within a selection index in other production systems and countries.

Keywords

feed efficiencyenvironmental impacteconomic weightselection indexanimal breeding
Type
Research Article
Information
animal , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , January 2020 , pp. 171 - 179
Copyright
© The Animal Consortium 2019 

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