Running two dairy farms in a cooperative model is proving costly in the Czech Republic in terms of logistics, labour and equipment costs.
With that in mind, the agricultural cooperative, Kozichovice, with a total of 600 milking cows, will merge its two farms onto one location with the goal of saving 15% in operational costs.
The co-op was founded in 1950, then re-established again in 1989 with 230 small land and property owners, following the Velvet Revolution which saw the end of communist rule in the country.
Farm manager, Jakub Fukal said: “The farm is located in the middle of the Czech Republic at an altitude of 465m above sea level with an average annual rainfall of around 450mm.
“We cultivate 2,100ha of crops, run two dairy farms and also operate a biogas plant. Elections within the co-op are held every five years and all members elect seven members onto the management board, from which one overall manager is chosen.
“In total, we run 600 cows of the Czech red breed, very like the Fleckvieh or Simmental breed, across the two farms. The herd’s average yield per cow is 9,100kg of milk at 3.8% butterfat and 3.5% protein. Each farm has 300 cows that are milked twice a day,” he added.
Czech co-op
Cows are housed in groups all year round according to their lactation, and fed an appropriate total mixed ration (TMR). Jakub practices artificial insemination (AI) on all the cows with genetics from Czech and German bulls.
He said: “Our breeding strategy is to have strong animals with healthy legs, bones and regular udders. Hand in hand with healthy animals goes longevity, which is also what we aim for.
“One of our goals from breeding is to try to improve the cows udder shape as we are struggling somewhat with udder irregularity.
“Currently, we use German and Czech bulls with GZW 130 or more, hornless bulls and bulls that improve udders, legs and milk. All the heifers undergo genomic testing and are paired with suitable sires to achieve our breeding goals,” he added.
The two farms within the co-op are operated independently of each other, but simultaneously. Two employees feed the cows and clean the barns, and two staff milk the cows on shift rotations.
In total, there are 16 people on both farms as part of the milking team. The co-op employs a total of 67 people, 24 of which work in the livestock production.
The cows are milked using two milking parlours; one DeLaval 2×7 herringbone type, and one Westfalia parlour 2×6 auto tandem type.
Jakub said: “Cows are milked twice per day. We start milking in the morning at 3:00a.m and finish at 8:00a.m, then in the afternoon we start milking at 2:00p.m and finish at 7:00p.m.
“Our milk is sold to Madeta, the largest dairy processor in the Czech Republic, which handles one million litres of milk per day. It is sold to the processor through a marketing cooperative, which delivers 100,000L of milk per day to the dairy.
“Our daily milk production is 16,000L. Based on the contracts, our average selling price of milk was 10.87 Czech Koruna (0.428 euro) per litre in 2023. However, at the start of 2024 we were trading at the price of 10.95 Czech Koruna per litre (0.431 euro).”
Cows are fed with a Storti horizontal feed wagon on one farm and the other farm uses a vertical feed wagon of the same brand.
The TMR ration for one cow per day consists of 24kg of maize silage, 10kg of alfalfa and peas, 7kg of complete feed mix, 2.5kg of rape meal, 0.5kg of straw, and 2-4L of water depending on the dry matter of the TMR.
Nutritional formulations are provided by the company Sano, which prepares rations according to the feed analysis.
The agricultural cooperative Kozichovice continues to invest in the farms upgrading equipment and the infrastructure. It does have big plans for the future to merge the two farms to one location.
Jakub said: “Last year, we bought a new feed wagon, and the ventilation system in the dairy barns was upgraded. We have plans later this year to construct a new DeLaval 2×15 parallel milking parlour on one of the farms with an 18,000L milk tank.
“And, we later plant to construct a new cow barn for 320 dairy cows sometime in 2025. We will also be modernising the barns for the dairy calves. The total investment for these projects is expected to be approximately 50 million Czech Koruna, around two million euro.
“The main reason for this significant investment is because in 2025, we aim to merge our two farms together into one location, to reduce operating costs, we hope by about 15%.
“We also plan to sell our own beef and milk through self-service vending machines on the farm,” he said.
As with most dairy farms around the world, the main problem on this co-op farm is sourcing experienced labour.
Jakub added: “At the moment, this hard labour job is not regarded as lucrative within society, especially because of weekend shifts, night shifts, etc.
“However, we try to offer people appropriate salary conditions and employ people mainly from the Czech Republic. In cooperation with the company Sano, we regularly carry out training for feeding and milking staff.
“Other challenges we face are fluctuating milk prices and the EU Green Deal will have some major implications.”
