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Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearchVolume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
19
Volume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017 • pages 19-29
ABSTRACT. A cross-sectional study
was designed to determine the level of
awareness of selected dairy farmers to herd
health program (HHP) and compliance in
the Program LadangAngkat (PLA). The
study also determined the association
between farmers’ awareness and
compliance in promoting herd health. An
open-ended questionnaire was randomly
administered to five dairy cattle farms
within Selangor and Negeri Sembilan as
representative dairy farms enlisted into the
PLA of Faculty of Veterinary Medicine,
Universiti Putra Malaysia. The mean herd
size of the farms was 102.20±20.80, with
a range of 30-160 heads of dairy cattle,
having an average mean number of milking
cows at 29.40±11.22. There was a higher
(p<0.05) mean herd health awareness level
(72.86±5.78%) among the farmers once
compared with the mean compliance level
(61.2 ± 4.1%) for 10 out of the 14 HHP
components; with the lowest compliances
being disease monitoring programme
(33.20%) and biosecurity (39.9%). There
was a significant (p<0.05), direct, weak
positive correlation (r = 0.245; p = 0.042)
between farmers’ awareness and farmers’
compliance to the 14 components of the
HHP. This study highlights an appreciable
A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY ON THE
ASSOCIATION BETWEEN FARMERS’ AWARENESS
AND COMPLIANCE ON HERD HEALTH PROGRAM
AMONG FIVE SELECTED DAIRY CATTLE FARMS
IN SELANGOR AND NEGERI SEMBILAN STATES,
MALAYSIA
FAEZ FIRDAUS JESSE ABDULLAH1,6*, MUHAMMAD ABUBAKAR SADIQ2,3, YUSUF
ABBA2,5, ABDUL MUHAIMIN ROPIE1, KONTO MOHAMMED1,4, ERIC LIM TEIK
CHUNG1, ASINAMAI ATHLIAMAI BITRUS2, NOOR HANANI BT MAT ISA1, MOHD
AZMI MOHD LILA1, ABDUL WAHID HARON1,6 AND ABDUL AZIZ SAHAREE1
1 Department of Veterinary Clinical Studies, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400
UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia.
2 Depar tment of Veterinary Pathology and Microbiology, Faculty of Veterinar y Medicine, Universiti Putra
Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia.
3 Department of Veterinary Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of
Maiduguri, PMB1069, Borno State, Nigeria.
4 Depar tment of Veterinary Microbiology and Parasitology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of
Maiduguri, PMB1069, Borno State, Nigeria.
5 Depar tment of Veterinary Pathology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Universit y of Maiduguri, PMB1069, Borno
State, Nigeria.
6 Research Centre for Ruminant Diseases, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400
UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia.
* Corresponding author: jesseariasamy@gmail.com
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearch Volume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
20
level of awareness among dairy farmers in
the PLA, with a relatively low compliance
levels to the HHP components.
Keywords: farmer education, herd
health programme, dairy farms, Malaysia,
milk production
INTRODUCTION
Over the past years the Malaysian livestock
industry has witnessed gradual progress
with the non-ruminant (poultry and swine)
industry recording remarkable growths,
while the ruminant industry lagged behind
(Jamaludin et al., 2014; Sithambaram and
Hassan, 2014). The failure in the ruminant
sub-sector of the livestock industry was
attributed to several factors that include;
the lack of incentives, uneconomic
production systems and inadequate
marketing strategies (Jalaluddin and
Halim, 1998). The tropical climate in
Malaysia may have played an unfavourable
role in the development of dairy farming
as high temperature, humidity and rainfall
were believed to cause reduction in both,
nutritive value of available forage and cow’s
comfort (Moran, 2013). Even with these
unfavourable conditions, the Malaysian
dairy sector has recorded some appreciable
levels of growth as in the Department of
Veterinary Services (DVS) report of 2013
which showed progress in milk production
from 38.7 million litres in 2004 to 79.35
million litres in 2013. This equates to a self-
sufficiency level increase from 2.98% to
9.30%, respectively (DVS, 2013). Although
the progress recorded in achieving self-
sufficiency in milk production level is not
much, a deliberate effort has been put in
place by the government to double local
milk production in the short term as well as
in the long term, resulting to an increased
self-sufficiency level (Mohd Karim et al.,
2014).
Over the past decades, dairy farming
has witnessed several changes, which
coupled with increasing international
competition has led to selective breeding
of high yielding dairy cows (Derks et al.,
2012), consequently resulting in higher
susceptibility to disease (De Kruif and
Opsomer, 2004). With this development
and intensification of dairy farming, many
disease and production related constraints
were encountered, hence prompting a
change in veterinary service delivery to
consist of herd approach rather than the
classical individual animal approach,
and elaboration of health and production
management programmes offering
integrated services (Brand et al., 1996).
The constraints in the development of the
dairy sector may be due to lack of farmers’
knowledge, technical skill, awareness and
compliance in herd health management
(Moran , 2013). Smallholder farmers with
less than 10 milking cows, usually have
not been able to develop the skills of
efficient milk production as a result of poor
extension services and lack of technical
knowledge on tropical dairy production
(Moran , 2013). Good farm management
means to supply sufficient farm inputs
for a desired level of production of
farm outputs, this means setting milk
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearchVolume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
21
production targets, and determining the
necessary farm requirements to achieve
these targets(Moran, 2012).
Healthy, productive and fertile dairy
cows and their necessary feed nutrients
supplied in forages and concentrates, are
the major requirement for achieving the
goals for a sustainable milk production in
any dairy system (Mora n, 2012). Certain
diseases and production constraints can
be expected in dairy farms as in any
livestock production system, on the basis
of accumulated experience. To minimize
the potential adverse effects of these
anticipated constraints and to protect
against unexpected ones, herd health
management and preventive medicine
programs or herd health program (HHP)
are designed with the objective to assist the
farmers in reaching their farm performance
goals. (Pugh and Baird, 2012; Derks et al.,
2014). Green and Green (2012) defined ‘herd
health management’ or HHP as ‘a method
to optimize health, welfare and production
in a population of dairy cows through the
systematic analysis of relevant data and
through regular objective observations of
the cows and their environment, such that
informed, timely decisions are made to
adjust and improve herd management over
time’. This concept of herd health program
(HHP) that integrates herd health, animal
welfare, public health and food quality
assurance has been shown to be effective
in improving farm productivity in the past
and also at present (Derks et al., 2014).
Herd health management programs
are designed to support farmers in changing
their focus from curative to preventive
health management practices, which are
necessitated by increased herd sizes and
meeting quality standards in dairy farming
(Derks et al., 2013). Dairy cattle farmers
in the Netherlands who participated in
veterinary herd health management were
shown to have produced 336 kg more of
milk per cow per year, lower age at first
calving (less than 12 days), lower repeat
breeder after artificial insemination (less
than 3.34%), better milk quality with
decreased milk somatic cell count (8340
cells/mL) as compared to farmers who
did not participate in the program (Derks
et al., 2014). Previously, (Abdullah et
al., 2015) conducted a survey to study
farmers’ compliance on HHP practiced
among goat farms in Malaysia. From the
results obtained, there seemed to be dearth
of information by farmers’ to awareness
on herd health program, implementation
and compliance in Malaysians.Based on
this, the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine
(FVM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM)
introduced an initiative called ‘Program
Ladang Angkat’ (PLA) in September 2011,
to the ruminant farmers with the aim of
assisting in solving issues associated with
low productivity among the dairy farmer.
Ruminant farmers within the vicinity of
40 km from the faculty were invited to
join PLA, where participating farmers
where given free consultation, diagnosis,
treatment and education on aspects related
to livestock herd health management. The
implementation of HHP of Ladang Angkat
was designed to be in several stages with
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearch Volume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
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emphasis on observation, implementation,
followed by a systematic analysis of the
impact and comparison with set out targets
of the participating farmers. This study
was designed to determine HHP awareness
and compliance level among selected dairy
cattle farmers participating in the PLA
and to determine the association between
farmers’ awareness and compliance with
the HHP. It is believed that the results
of this study will give an insight into
the effectiveness of the PLA herd health
programme implementation in all the
participating dairy farms.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Study design
The survey was conducted in the form of a
simple closed-ended questionnaire which
was administered to all the five randomly
selected (by balloting) dairy cattle farms
(n=5) that were enlisted into the Program
Ladang Angkat of FVM, UPM located
in Selangor and Negeri Sembilan. The
questionnaires were designed using simple
and common words in both English and
Malay languages in order to ensure proper
comprehension by the participating farmers
to respond accurately. The questionnaire
comprised of 2 sections; section A (farm
profile) and section B (farmer compliance
with HHP). Section A was adapted from
the farm profile of Malaysian Good
Agriculture Practice (MyGAP) evaluation
form sourced from the Department of
Veterinary Services (http://www.moa.
gov.my/docume nts /10157/1683433), which
consisted of the types of management,
roofing and flooring, milking facilities,
animal performance, sales per month and
medication. Section B consists of questions
concerning the farmer’s knowledge,
awareness and compliance on each of
the 14 components of the herd health
programs such as (a) housing condition,
(b) feed and feeding management, (c)
deworming program, (d) vaccination
program, (e) farm biosecurity, (f) waste
disposal management, (g) fly, pest and
odour control, (h) milking management,
(i) reproductive management, (j) calf
management, (k) cow management, (l)
animal identification, (m) drug management
and lastly (n) disease monitoring program.
Farmers were interviewed for section A,
and filled out the responses for section B
farmers by themselves or interviewed by
the researcher depending on the farmer’s
preference. Visual examination of the farm
environment was also done.
Data Collection
Questionnaire
90% of the questions in the questionnaires
were structured to have dichotomous
answers (yes and no). Detailed questions
about each component as “yes” and “no”
type of questions were used to determine
the level of farmers’ awareness and
compliance on each HHP component. The
questionnaires were collected on the same
day after completion.
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearchVolume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
23
Data Analysis
All the respondents’ data were entered
into Microsoft Office Excel 2010 and
analysed in IBM SPSS statistical software
version 20. Data were analysed to obtain
descriptive statistics, mean, standard error
of mean and percentages. Spearman’s rho
correlation was used to determine linear
correlationbetween farmers’ awareness and
farmers’ compliance on the 14 components
of HHP at alpha (α) level of 0.05 according
to Corder and Foreman (2014).
RESU LT S
General information on farm
management and herd population
All the dairy cattle farms (n=5) accepted to
participate and with all the questionnaires
(100%) were returned. The mean herd size
was 102.20±20.80 with a range from 30
to 160 heads of dairy cattle. Among these
herds the average number of milking cows
was 29.40±11.22 cows with range from 5
cows to 70 cows. There were a total of 78
calves in all the five herds with a mean
of 15.60±4.34. Two of the farms reported
the use of traditional hand milking method
(Table 1).
Farmers’ herd health program (HHP)
awareness
From the five farms, two farmers responded
to having knowledge on what HHP is,
however only one was able to define HHP,
while the other 3 farmers had never heard
of the word before getting enlisted into
the PLA. Following enrolment into the
PLA, four out of five farmers;mean ± SE
(72.86±5.78%) learnt about the HHP from
Program Ladang Angkat and by discussing
with other fellow farmers, while 3 out of
5 learnt about it from courses offered by
the Department of Veterinary Services of
Malaysia.
Table 1. Data on farm management and herd population structure
Farm
Production
system
Milking
facilities Total herd
Milking
Cow
Non milking
and heifer Calf Bull
ASemi intensive Herringbone
parlour 30 17 (57%) 013 (43%) 0
BSemi intensive Portable
machine 106 70 (66%) 30 (28%) 5 (5%) 1 (1%)
CSemi intensive Portable
machine 160 35 (22%) 113 (71%) 10 (6%) 2 (1%)
DSemi intensive Hand milking 111 5 (4%) 85 (77%) 20 (18%) 1 (1%)
ESemi intensive Hand milking 104 20 (19%) 50 (48%) 30 (29%) 4 (4%)
Total 511 147 278 78 8
Mean±SE 102.20±20.80 29.40±11.22 55.60±19.92 15.60±4.34 1.6±0.68
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearch Volume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
24
Level of farmer compliance on 14
components of HHP
Figure 1 shows the distribution level of
participating farmers’ compliance (%)
based on each component of HHP with
mean ± SE (61.2 ± 4.1%). The lowest
farmer compliance was recorded in
disease monitoring program (33.20%),
followed by farm biosecurity (39.9%).
Other measures such as cow management,
reproductive management, feed and feeding
management, animal identification; fly, pest
and odour control, milking management,
calf management, housing condition were
recorded in varying levels, ranging from
50% to 70%,respectively. These were
followed by drug management and parasite
control program recorded in over 70% of
farms. The highest was waste disposal
management and vaccination program
with 86.8% and 83.2%, respectively.
Association between farmer awareness
and compliance on 14 components in
HHP
There was an appreciable awareness
of farmers (72.86 ± 44.79) to the HHP
components among the dairy cattle
farmers; however, this did not necessarily
correlate to the farmers’ compliance (61.18
± 25.26) on each component of the HHP.
Based on Figure 2, a clustered bar graph
revealed two distinct scenarios, where
blue and brown colour bars represent the
Figure 1. Bar chart of farmer compliance on each component of HHP (%)
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearchVolume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
25
first scenario in which farmers’ awareness
percentage was higher than farmers’
compliance percentage whereas in the
second scenario, components such as
waste disposal management, reproductive
management, animal identification and
drug management (blue and green colour
bar) had farmers’ compliance percentages
recorded as higher than farmers’ awareness
percentages, which may be due to the
presence of bias element in responding to
the questions asked.Shapiro Wilk test for
normality showed that the data of farmers’
awareness was not normally distributed,
since p (0.028) < α (0.05), whereas data
for farmers’ compliance was normally
distributed since p (0.910) > α (0.05).
Thus, a non-parametric, Spearman’s rho
was chosen to determine the correlation
between both variables since one of the
Figure 2. Clustered Bar chart of Correlation between farmers’ compliance on each of the 14
component of HHP (%)
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearch Volume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
26
variables was a non-parametricvariable.
There was a significant low positive
correlation between the farmers’
awareness and farmers’ compliance on
the 14 components of HHP; r = 0.245 and
p = 0.042
DISCUSSION
Historically agriculture has been the
mainstay of Malaysia’s economy and the
livestock industry has progressed gradually
over the years, however, the ruminant
sector of this industry is lagging behind.
The livestock sector in Malaysia produce
2,025,000 metric tonnes of food in 2010,
accounting for 27% of the total domestic
food production. This in economic terms
translates to RM10,870 million in total
ex-farm value of livestock products in
2010 (Jamaludin et al., 2014). Among the
many constrains militating against the
development of the dairy industry is that
many of the small holder dairy farmers
have not been able to develop their skills
for efficient milk production (Moran,
2013). Some of the major aims of the HHP
in dairy production are to optimize health,
welfare and production in a population of
dairy cows in order to assist the farmers
in reaching their farm performance goals.
In this study all (100%) farmers that
participated responded to the questionnaire,
which was expected based on the
previous study by Dillman and Bowker
(2001), which stated that participants
in a survey who were interested in the
topic are usually willing to answer the
questionnaires administered. The average
herd size obtained in this study was higher
compared to the average herd size of 2.46
and 4.29±0.864 reported by Wanjala and
Njehia (2014) and Atuhaire et al. (2 014),
in Kenya and Uganda, respectively.The
difference in the herd sizes could be as a
result of differences in herd characteristics,
where dairy cattle sampled were those
from household smallholder farms, while
in this study, the participating farms were
commercial farms which were relatively
larger. The proportion of 28.77% and
54.40% were recorded for lactating and
non-lactating/heifers in the sampled herds.
This finding was in contrast with Wanjala
and Njehia (2014), who reported proportions
of 36.4% and 15% for lactating cows and
heifers, respectively. The discrepancy
seen between lactating and non-lactating
heifers in this study was an indication of
lack of efficiency in milk production from
lactating cows in the herds.
Varying degree of compliance
was recorded, with lowest from disease
monitoring program and farm biosecurity.
These are very vital in improving and
sustaining productivity of the dairy
animals, which could also be another
reason for the wide gap between the
proportion of lactating and non-lactating/
heifers. Diseases are known to reduce milk
yield, fertility and conception rate in dairy
cattle ultimately resulting to an increased
number of non-lactating mature cows in
the farm. This agrees with the assertion
of Gröhn and Rajala-Schultz (2000), who
observed that diseases and reproductive
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearchVolume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
27
disorders are responsible for decreased
milk yield, delayed insemination and
conception rate in dairy cows, which may
often result in increased the risk of culling
in such farms.
The farmers’ compliance with
components of the HHP; waste disposal,
reproductive management, animal
identification and drug management
recorded higher levels than the farms’
awareness in this study. This could be
attributed to response bias by the farmers
in order to avoid a bad impression about
their farm. Derks et al. (2014) reported a
similar finding, where out of ten variables
only two were seen to have significantly
different results than the other eight
variables due to bias in responses.Another
reason for this bias may be the fact that
questionnaires were sometimes not filled
by the farmers themselves but their
children or workers. In this study, two
of the five questionnaires were filled by
the farmer’s son and a farm worker, who
may not have all the relevant information
requested. The other ten components in
this study showed that farmers’ awareness
were higher than the farmers’ compliance
level. Moran (2013) identified several key
constrains militating against increased
milk production in tropical Asia, which
indirectly affected farmers’ compliance
on HHP. These limiting factors have been
categorised into institutional factors,
such as lack of skill or training from
extension services and socio-economic
factors, such as the farmer’s education
and traditional beliefs (Mora n, 2013).
Previously, Devendra (2000) identif ied
other constraint factors such as availability
of species and breeds, feed resources and
feeding, breeding, production and animal
health, marketing and market outlets.
In this study, there were two putative
constraint factors militating against
farmers’ compliance; not all farmers
participated in the seminar (Hari Bersama
Penternak) and practical training organised
by Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, under
the PLA. Thus such farmers have lost the
opportunity of acquiring valuable lessons
that could be applied to improve their farm
productivity. The examples of lessons given
during such contacts with experts include:
theory and practical sessions on the use of
anthelmintic for treatment and prophylaxis
of different gastrointestinal worms and
pasture management techniques aimed
at reducing survivability of parasites by
interrupting their the life cycle. This would
help farmers to reduce worm burden in
their livestock. There are a number of farm
procedures that could be taught as well, for
example procedures to prevent and control
mastitis in dairy farms and many other
disease preventive measures.
The second factor affecting farmers’
compliance on HHP was socio-economic
factors such as level of farmer education
and traditional beliefs (Mora n, 2013). Even
though the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine,
UPM had conducted training either on the
farm or during the seminar’s practical,
about dairy farm practice lessons, some
farmers still did not put it into practice
because they kept their traditional beliefs
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearch Volume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
28
and experiences in running the farm. Such
farmers will not be able to save production
costs and improve the farm productivity.
Individual farmer’s attitude and level of
education also affects the acceptance of the
lesson or advice given. Farmers’ decision
making has been shown to be a complex
process which involves many factors like
intention to change, social environment
and attitude towards the area of change
(Bergevoet et al., 2004; Ellis-Iversen et
al., 2010). Cost is among one of the many
factors limiting the implementation of HHP
as most of the dairy cattle farms in the PLA
tend to practice animal naming system
instead of number tagging, because they
thought tagging was more costly. Similar
cost constraints and inadequate knowledge
and skill have also been identified as
factors militating against HHP compliance
among goat farms in Malaysia (Abdullah et
al., 2015). Farmers will appreciate HHP if
the cost of implementing does not exceed
the total profit gained from a cow per year
(Derks et al., 2014).
Success in the implementation of
HHP and optimal farmers’ compliance
could be difficult to achieve due to poor
communication between veterinarians
and farmers. Thus effort to discuss topics
related to herd health management, animal
performance and farm productivity such as
mastitis control, herd fertility programme,
disease prevention programme and
nutrition are not effectively done. This
observation agrees with Derks et al.
(2012) and Derks et al. (2 014), who also
observed that optimal communication
between farmer and veterinarian is
not always achieved thereby resulting
in communication gap between the
veterinarian advice and the dairy farmers’
needs and targeted production goals. The
way information is communicated to the
farmer and the priority of the information
for the farmer may influence the level of
farmers’ compliance in dairy HHP (Derks
et al., 2012).
CONCLUSION
It can therefore be concluded that this study
has found a higher level of awareness with
a corresponding lower level of compliance
in 10 out of the 14 HHP components among
farmers under the PLA. Lower level of
farmers’ compliance was seen in vital
components such as disease monitoring and
prevention programme, farm biosecurity,
reproductive programme, feed and feeding
managementand animal identification. This
is due to lack of knowledge, constraints
in finance, influence of their traditional
belief and poor ineffective communication
between veterinarian and farmers. There is
a need to encourage farmers to participate
in disease surveillance programmes of
the Department of Veterinary Services
Malaysia for routine endemic disease
screening such as Brucellosis and Food
and Mouth Disease. There is also a need
to help the dairy farmers in the form
of training and guidance via extension
services given by institution such as
Department of Veterinary Service and
Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Universiti
Mal aysi an Journal of Veterinary r esearchVolume 8 No. 1 JaNu ar y 2017
29
Putra Malaysia through PLA. Further
cross-sectional studies comparing between
dairy cattle farms participating and non-
participating in the herd health programme
will provide invaluable information on the
impact of HHP on farm productivity.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT. The author s wish to acknowled ge
Mohd Jefri Norsidin, members of staff of the Large Animal
Clinic, Un iversity Veteri nary hospital (UVH), andFaculty
of Veterinar y Medicine Un iversiti Put ra Malaysia for their
technical assista nce.
CONF LICT OF I NTE REST. The authors declare no
conf lict of interest.
