Success Stories in Asia’s Quest for Increasing Its Domestic Milk Production

Abstract

Throughout the humid tropics of Asia, smallholder dairy (SHD) farmers have developed their production systems largely based on the “traditional way of doing things”. Tradition is a generic word used in this case to mean basing farm management decisions and practices on how their father, or friends or even next door neighbours do things. The low levels of milk production and herd fertility, the high incidences of calf mortalities and poor animal health (such as lameness and mastitis) and the inferior quality of much of the milk sourced from these farms are clear indications that many of these traditional farm management practices are in urgent need of re-evaluation. This need not necessarily be the norm and this paper provides two good examples of how innovation can pay off in the humid tropics of Bangladesh. They clearly demonstrated that improving herd management, particularly feeding management, can dramatically increase cow performance with higher milk yields and herd fertility.