Assessment of Economic Impact of Implementing Ration Balancing Programme in Lactating Cows and Buffaloes under Field Conditions

Lactation trial of 120 days duration was conducted on 2536 lactating animals in twenty five villages in Junagadh District in Gujarat State to study the effect of implementation of ration balancing programme on milk production and cost of milk production. For the field study, 2536 lactating animals (cows-827 and Buffaloes-1709), 8–10 weeks post calving, yielding 6 to12 kg milk/d, belonging to 1250 farmers were selected. Daily milk yield and feed intake of all the animals were recorded. Milk samples were drawn monthly and analysed for milk fat. After 15 days of recording, the ration of all the animals was balanced for total digestible nutrients (TDN), crude protein (CP), calcium and phosphorus using the ration balancing software developed by National Dairy Development Board (NDDB), which is based on Kearl (1982) standards for buffaloes and NRC (1989) for cows, and the balanced diet was fed to all the animals. Analysis of nutritional status of animals before ration balancing revealed that 89.4 and 60.9% of animals were overfed in terms of TDN and CP, respectively and 45.8% and 76.00 of the animals were underfed in terms of calcium and phosphorus, respectively. Average increase of 0.58kg milk/animal/day and 0.5% milk fat, were observed in the lactating animals after ration balancing which were significantly (P<0.05) higher than before implementation of the programme. After ration balancing, there was also an average reduction in feeding cost (Rs/kg milk) from 9.45 to 7.47, which was significantly (P<0.05) lower. With ration balancing the farmer's net income increased by Rs 31.49/day. The results suggest that ration balancing has the potential to improve performance of animal and farmers income in lactating buffaloes and cows.