Improving the Resilience of Dairy Farms

With significantly reduced profit margins on dairy farms at present, farmers are looking at ways to reduce costs. Energy, veterinary and labour costs are areas that should be considered while ensuring that short term savings don’t result in reduced efficiency or long-term problems.

CAFRE calf house

The College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE) staff, Lauren Curry, Michael Garvey and Anna Truesdale have expanded on some of the areas in the following article.

Energy

Lauren Curry, CAFRE Carbon Technologist, outlines that CAFRE benchmarking figures suggest a dairy farm uses between 1-2 kwh of electricity per cow per day on milking related activities. Benchmarking feedback, throughout the UK & Ireland, suggest that dairy farms could reduce their electricity usage on farm by up to 50%. Reducing energy costs will reduce the cost of milk production and improve business resilience to market volatility.

Farms should firstly carry out an energy audit, to identify when and how much electricity is required. This can be done by keeping records of electricity usage through smart meters or manual meter checks. Then the information can be used to evaluate energy suppliers and switch supplier if better pricing is available.

Next consider lowering heat waste by insulating pipes, if it’s not being used have it switched off, use timers to utilizer lower night electricity rates where possible, and keep equipment maintained to avoid higher energy usage. Evaluate lighting requirements and consider LED’s which can lower electricity consumption by 60% and have a longer lifespan compared to sodium lights.

Energy efficiency technologies can be optimised or installed to reduce energy usage. Boost plate cooler efficiencies through ensuring adequate water supply. Invest in a variable speed vacuum pump to lower parlour electricity use by up to 60%, compared to set speed. Utilise heat recovery units to minimize energy losses through heat, and lower heating energy requirements. The right combination of energy efficiency technologies can lower overall electricity usage in the parlour by up to 82%.

Table 1. Potential benefits of Energy Efficient Technologies

Animal Health

Michael Garvey, CAFRE Dairy Adviser, advises that managing herd health continues to be vital, despite reduced margins for milk at present. Vaccines may be expensive and can affect cashflow when they are purchased but they can prevent catastrophic disease outbreaks when administered following the instructions of the manufacturer. It is usually much cheaper to prevent a disease than attempt to cure it after it has occurred. You will inevitably lose significant milk production during a disease outbreak, through milk withhold at treatment and animals not milking to their full potential. You should continue to use the vaccination programme directed by your vet in your own herd health plan.

Beware of buying, possibly cheap, animals from sources where the full animal history is not known. Your herd disease status will be put at risk if you do this. Good biosecurity measures used around your farm are low cost and key to preventing disease spread such as TB.

Selective dry cow therapy (SDCT) protocols have been adopted on many farms and should continue to be used. SDCT can save on cost as well as helping to reduce your annual anti-microbial use.

Calf rearing is another important area where calf disease can significantly impact on performance and profitability. Adequate colostrum intake, keeping bedding dry, good drainage, frequent cleaning out and effective ventilation in sheds can help prevent calf pneumonia. They are all relatively low-cost measures to implement.

If you have an automated health monitoring system for your dairy herd, use the alerts to allow early intervention and prevent an illness getting worse. This can often take the form of rehydration therapy or the administration of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). NSAID’s can reduce pain and speed recovery of affected animals. All medication and changes to vaccination programmes should be subject to veterinary advice.

Labour

Anna Truesdale, CAFRE Dairy Adviser, says that a reduction in margins is often the catalyst for a review on input costs across all dairy farms. However, care must be taken when reviewing labour input. In most circumstances hours worked by paid labour is an obvious area to cut back but be aware of the full impact of this decision. How will it impact production and who will pick up the slack? A key resource is you as a manager and working long hours leaves less time to manage and plan, which can mean that challenges and opportunities are missed that will have a greater benefit that the wages saved.

CAFRE benchmarking indicates that paid labour costs around 0.54ppl on an average NI dairy farm (or around £43/cow/year). Instead of immediately cutting hours of paid staff and leaving yourself with more work to do, take a moment to review the labour efficiency on your farm. Ask yourself - can I reduce the workload on the farm to allow a sustained reduction of labour cost?

If you’re within a calving cycle, evaluate the efficiency of your calf-rearing. Again, ask yourself a number of questions- Are calves staying too long in single pens? Could they be batched in bigger groups? Is tagging laborious – could this be done along with colostrum-feeding? Would a milk-taxi be a worthwhile investment on your farm to free up labour during feeding? Would a whiteboard improve communication between calf-feeders? If you’re mixing milk, is the powder and hot water in the calf accommodation?

Similarly, look at no cost or low-cost improvements that could be made with the milking routine. Or could cow-flow be improved to reduce the total hours needed to complete a milking? Simple low-cost solutions like swinging gates or gates in the correct place can make a big difference in labour demand.

In terms of feeding, keep machinery well maintained, serviced and safe to allow it to work as efficiently as possible. Are batch ingredients kept in bulk for easy access and loading? Are there multiple batches of youngstock for example that could be fed together? Could covers on silos be rolled back every few days instead of everyday?

Labour is a complex piece to manage, there is ‘no one-size-fits-all’ to reducing total hours worked on farm. There is a fine balance to be found between making best use of paid labour and keeping staff happy and motivated. Communication and a regular review of practice are key throughout and don’t forget to look after yourself too! 

In conclusion, saving costs this winter will be by many small changes, which will all add up. Look carefully at your dairy business now and spend some time evaluating how you manage the herd. Check where savings could be made, in energy, veterinary and with labour. Talk to your local CAFRE Dairy Adviser, contacts are available within the CAFRE website. For more information and resources on how to making your dairy business more resilient visit the CAFRE website.

Notes to editors: 

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2. All media queries should be directed to the DAERA Press Office: pressoffice.group@daera-ni.gov.uk or telephone: 028 9052 4619.

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