Percentage of concentrates used on organic dairy farms

The percentage of concentrates used in the ’dairy cattle and rearing’ enterprise or production branch of organic commercial dairies is estimated on the basis of accounting data. On average this comes to 5 %, with 45 % of farms feeding less than 5 % concentrates. There are very few farms that use no concentrates at all. The percentage of concentrates in feed increases with the size of the dairy herd, and in particular with milk yield. Organic farms in the lowland region use a significantly lower percentage of concentrates than farms in the upland and mountain regions. In terms of profitability, no differences were noted for any of the three regions – lowland, upland or mountain – between farms feeding a percentage of concentrate either greater or less than 5 %.