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Italy: Performance and Competitiveness of Italian Dairy Farms   FARM S/STEM

Sistema Stalla

Goal of the FARM S/STEM project is to assess the competitiveness of Italian dairy Farms. CLAL selected a group of dairy Farmers of Northern Italy having a special interest in performance analysis and costs and sent out its Team to assess the herd management on these Farms and to collect dairy farm data.



Dairy Farms in the project

The group of dairy Farms monitored in the project is not a representative sample of Italian farms but rather a selection of farms having a special interest in performance analysis and costs.
The data displayed refer to the 2012 calendar year. Sixteen (16) dairy Farms of Northern Italy participate in the project; these are shown on the map below with their respective herd size.

mappa delle aziende

The bar chart below ranks the dairy Farms based on the number of lactating cows. The colour of the first horizontal bar, which measures the number of lactating cows, is based on the destination of the milk produced: blue for Liquid Milk, orange for the production of Grana Padano and green for the production of Parmigiano-Reggiano.

map of dairy farms


PERFORMANCE (2012)   FARM S/STEM

Performance measurements of dairy Farms in the FARM S/STEM project:



Israel 2011: 24.4 months
Source: The Israeli Herdbook 2011




Country Year Milk per cow (tons)
Italy 2023 8.20
Germany 2016 7.48
France 2016 6.65
Ireland 2016 4.90
The Netherlands 0.00
Poland 2016 0.00
Sources: EUROSTAT, AGEA, AIA
Data taken from page EU-27: Average cow milk yield visit the page »

RETURNS (2012)   FARM S/STEM


Show/hide a detailed breakdown of the Returns considered.
  • Sale of milk (quality premiums included)
  • Cows sold for slaughter
  • Sale of male calves
  • Sale of heifers and other replacement animals
  • Sale of agricultural products
  • Income from photovoltaic energy production
  • Income from biogas plant
  • Revenues from CAP subsidies
  • Revenues from other subsidies



COSTS (2012)   FARM S/STEM

Show/Hide the Simulated Feed Ration, that records the monthly variations
of the market value of concentrated animal feed.

The chart below records the monthly variations of the market value of concentrated animal feed.

It presents the market value of a Simulated Feed Ration, a theoretical feed model exclusively based on the use of corn and soybean extraction meal 44%; this has been taken as a model since the two constituent ingredients are the price drivers for all the raw materials available on the market.
The composition of the Simulated Feed Ration is as follows:

Corn meal70%Raw proteins as fed19%
Soybean extraction meal 44% protein30%Value in MFU1,05

The monthly price of the products corresponds to the average monthly quotation of the Commodities Exchange of the Milan Chamber of Commerce.



Data taken from page Feed composition analysis visit the page »



Data taken from page Italy: Prices of mineral fertilizers visit the page »

Electric power price and forecast
2012 2013 2014 2015
PUN price €/Mwh 75.53 63.00 52.00 51.00
variation over time -16.59% -31.15% -32.48%
Dairy farm electric power cost:
% on returns 2.23% 1.86% 1.54% 1.51%
€/100kg of milk 1.29 1.08 0.89 0.87
Source: data processed by Intesa Sanpaolo based on GME data at November 7, 2014
Brent oil price and forecast
2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
USD/barrel 111.7 108.7 105.2 100.7 101.9
variation over time -2.75% -5.84% -9.87% -8.80%
Dairy farm fuel, oil & lubrificants cost:
% on returns 4.02% 3.91% 3.79% 3.62% 3.67%
€/100kg of milk 2.30 2.24 2.17 2.07 2.10
Source: data processed by Intesa Sanpaolo based on Bloomberg data at
September 23, 2014

Performance of Dairy Farms

The new spider web chart allows to compare the performance of your dairy Farm with the performance of the dairy Farms participating in the project by entering your data in a simple form.

EU-27: Dairy Farm Structure

The charts below are a snapshot of the current structuring and herd size of dairy farms in some European countries. Comparisons should be made based on the overall structure and not on absolute values (the scales in the various charts differ).
The second row of charts allows a comparison between the four most productive Italian Regions.



Data taken from page EU-27: Dairy Farm Structure visit the page »

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