how different perspectives may improve our understanding
of cattle-health challenges.
The economic perspective
The economic perspective focuses on how data from
accounting and performance measures may help farmers
and veterinarians to better understand and act upon
their biological data. Biological datasets lack information
on prices, revenues and costs, and can only be used for
calculating partial productivity indices such as milk yield
per cow and herd fertility. To sustain the farm in the
long run, farmers need at least to consider their costs
and revenues, regardless of what is their primary reason
for being a farmer. Supplementing cattle databases with
economic data indicates the profitability of the biological
production. In addition to biological productivity
measures such as number of veterinary treatments per
cow, economic data add the possibility of calculating
economic performance measures such as gross margin
(revenues deducted variable costs) per cow or net farm
income (all revenues minus all expenses).
Economic data can be collected from different sources.
An obvious source of economic data is the farm accountancy.
For example, in Norway, TINE Efficiency Analysis
(TEA) merges data from the cattle database and the
farm accountancy. The farm bookkeeper sends selected
accountancy data to a database, and the consultant in
TINE SA adds some additional information on feeding
of young stock, use of acreage, etc. The consultant calculates
several productivity and profitability measures
and delivers reports to the farmer once a year. Results
are stored in the central cattle database along with data
from comparable farms. TINE SA offers a follow-up
either on the farm or in a workshop together with other
farmers. Approximately 1800 Norwegian dairy farmers