The intensive nature of farming in some parts of the European continent was highlighted last month when a group of industry representatives from NI visited a mixed farm outside Brussels in Belgium.

The event was facilitated by local MEP Diane Dodds who also hosted the group on a visit to the European Parliament and organised various meetings with officials and other politicians working in Brussels.

The farm visit was to a large 150ha beef, dairy and cropping farm run by Bart Vanderstraeten. In total, there are 350 cows on the farm, evenly split between beef and dairy. Various crops such as potatoes, beet and maize are also grown.

There has been significant recent investment in the dairy enterprise on the farm, with a group of around 90 Holstein cows held in a containment system and milked through two Lely robots. Cows are averaging 10,320 litres and fed a diet mainly based on grass silage and fodder beet. A total of 12.8kg of concentrate per 100 litres of milk was being fed through the robots.

Bart estimated his production cost at 32c/litre (22.4p/litre), and he was currently receiving 29c/litre (20.3p/litre) for milk. The farm has debt per cow of around €6,000.

Anaerobic digester

The slurry from the dairy unit is all put through an anaerobic digestion plant, which was generating all the electricity used on the farm, with surplus sold into the grid. Payback on the investment was five to six years.

Within his beef enterprise, all cows are pedigree Belgian Blue. Virtually all calvings are done by caesarean section, with the calf removed immediately from the cow and taken to a specialist rearing unit. Holstein and Belgian Blue calves are reared together, with bull calves from both breeds sold at 15 days, and destined for veal production in Holland. Holstein bulls sell for €50 to €80, while Blue bulls average €850. All heifer calves from both breeds are kept as replacements.

According to Bart, his pedigree Belgian Blue cows do not have enough milk to rear a calf. After being milked at calving, with the colostrum fed to the calf, the cows are dry for the rest of the year. They go to grass in the summer and are tied in individual stalls during the winter.

Given that all calvings are by caesarean section, the Blue cows are only kept for a maximum of three calvings. They are then taken for slaughter, with sales this year averaging around €2,200 per cow. Replacement heifers are AI’d at around 16 months.