I agree that this is old news, however, the comment about the antibiotics is not accurate. I visited an organic farmer last summer who was using a robotic milker for his 40 or so dairy cows. He was very happy with the system.
How is my text about the antibiotics not accurate?
I was writing about big farming companies with many cows. To keep a lot of animals healthy in a narrow space you have to inject each cow antibiotics in advance.
Antibiotic in livestock is a real problem already - at least in the Europe. The media and the doctors speak open about the issues, yet some big farming companies don't care.
Everyone is fine if farmer inject antibiotics to ill cows. But giving all cows antibiotics all the time (in advance), just in case, is the problem. People will drink & eat it and if they get ill or are in hospital, the same antibiotics has no good effect anymore. And people already die because the aftermath (hospital bug).
Due to having heard this topic in detail at university, I think the link between high antibiotic use and robotic milking is not the case.
One robot can only deal with a relatively little amount of cows in a day. I remember something around a hundred. And industrial scale human-involved systems are at a much bigger scale. If anything, these large-scale systems would require more antibiotics.
Over time the antibiotic management should even improve through the availability of per-quarter, per-cow data on the performance of the cow. Some antibiosis is often necessary, and probably can't be avoided if you don't want cows suffering unduly, or getting culled because without treatment the cow won't be profitable anymore. But that is a whole different kind of animal... err.... discussion
To qualify this a little, there is a way the robots can increase antibiotic use, and that would be if the hygiene of the robot is worse than that of other milking systems. But this does not seem to be the case. The robot would probably serve less "customers" with more thorough cleaning in between...
It has nothing todo with robots per se. Robots just make it a lot easier to feed a lot more animals in a narrow space with little human interaction.
In the United States, the use of antibiotics in livestock
is still prevalent. The FDA reports that 80 percent of
all antibiotics sold in 2009 were administered to
livestock animals, and that many of these antibiotics are
identical or closely related to drugs used for treating
illnesses in humans. Consequently, many of these drugs
are losing their effectiveness on humans, and the total
healthcare costs associated with drug-resistant bacterial
infections in the United States are between $16.6 billion
and $26 billion annually
No, traditional milking systems allow more intensive cattle stables than robotic systems. Which doesn't matter in Europe, because the space requirements per cow are a lot higher than the minimum possible. If anything, the robot allows for a less stressful milking and probably "happier" cows.
I can't see any connection between increased use of antibiotics and autonomous milking....
At least in Europe? One might argue that Europe has its eyes open. That Wikipedia page states: "On 1 January 2006 the European Union banned the non-medicinal use of antibiotics in livestock production."
That takes care (formally) of a substantial part of Europe. Regulations such as these also tend to spread because they limit the ability to export produce that does not follow them (that's how lead-free soldering conquered the world based on a EU directive, and how Californian pollution limits for cars spread over the USA, etc)
If you think those rules get broken so often that this is more of a problem in Europe than in, say, the USA, Canada, Australia, or Asia, can you give a link?
"Confinement at high stocking density is one part of a
systematic effort to produce the highest output at the
lowest cost by relying on economies of scale, modern
machinery, biotechnology, and global trade. Confinement
at high stocking density requires the use of antibiotics
and pesticides to mitigate the spread of disease and
pestilence exacerbated by these crowded living
conditions. In addition, antibiotics are used to
stimulate livestock growth by killing intestinal
bacteria."
It's actually not that easy... There are other factors at work. Often antibiotics only avoid growth depression, and in many cases the space requirements are higher anyway. The robot doesn't come into this discussion at all...
How is my text about the antibiotics not accurate?
It was inaccurate because the robotic milkers do not necessitate antibiotics in any way. There's no increased need for antibiotics because a cow is milked by a robot instead of a human.
Antibiotic in livestock is a real problem already
In the dairy industry, if a cow is on antibiotics her milk is dumped at the order of the company that buys the milk for bottling and distribution to consumers. At least that's how it works on my neighbor's farm, who sells milk to a regional dairy distributor.
Comments
I agree that this is old news, however, the comment about the antibiotics is not accurate. I visited an organic farmer last summer who was using a robotic milker for his 40 or so dairy cows. He was very happy with the system.
How is my text about the antibiotics not accurate?
I was writing about big farming companies with many cows. To keep a lot of animals healthy in a narrow space you have to inject each cow antibiotics in advance.
Antibiotic in livestock is a real problem already - at least in the Europe. The media and the doctors speak open about the issues, yet some big farming companies don't care.
Everyone is fine if farmer inject antibiotics to ill cows. But giving all cows antibiotics all the time (in advance), just in case, is the problem. People will drink & eat it and if they get ill or are in hospital, the same antibiotics has no good effect anymore. And people already die because the aftermath (hospital bug).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antibiotic_use_in_livestock#Con...
Due to having heard this topic in detail at university, I think the link between high antibiotic use and robotic milking is not the case.
One robot can only deal with a relatively little amount of cows in a day. I remember something around a hundred. And industrial scale human-involved systems are at a much bigger scale. If anything, these large-scale systems would require more antibiotics.
Over time the antibiotic management should even improve through the availability of per-quarter, per-cow data on the performance of the cow. Some antibiosis is often necessary, and probably can't be avoided if you don't want cows suffering unduly, or getting culled because without treatment the cow won't be profitable anymore. But that is a whole different kind of animal... err.... discussion
To qualify this a little, there is a way the robots can increase antibiotic use, and that would be if the hygiene of the robot is worse than that of other milking systems. But this does not seem to be the case. The robot would probably serve less "customers" with more thorough cleaning in between...
It has nothing todo with robots per se. Robots just make it a lot easier to feed a lot more animals in a narrow space with little human interaction.
-- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factory_farmingThe same goes for some countries in Europe. And as companies are importing goods from cheap farming companies such food can be found everywhere.
No, traditional milking systems allow more intensive cattle stables than robotic systems. Which doesn't matter in Europe, because the space requirements per cow are a lot higher than the minimum possible. If anything, the robot allows for a less stressful milking and probably "happier" cows.
I can't see any connection between increased use of antibiotics and autonomous milking....
At least in Europe? One might argue that Europe has its eyes open. That Wikipedia page states: "On 1 January 2006 the European Union banned the non-medicinal use of antibiotics in livestock production."
That takes care (formally) of a substantial part of Europe. Regulations such as these also tend to spread because they limit the ability to export produce that does not follow them (that's how lead-free soldering conquered the world based on a EU directive, and how Californian pollution limits for cars spread over the USA, etc)
If you think those rules get broken so often that this is more of a problem in Europe than in, say, the USA, Canada, Australia, or Asia, can you give a link?
An even better article is on the German Wikipedia: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intensivtierhaltung#Antibiotika...
It's actually not that easy... There are other factors at work. Often antibiotics only avoid growth depression, and in many cases the space requirements are higher anyway. The robot doesn't come into this discussion at all...
It was inaccurate because the robotic milkers do not necessitate antibiotics in any way. There's no increased need for antibiotics because a cow is milked by a robot instead of a human.
In the dairy industry, if a cow is on antibiotics her milk is dumped at the order of the company that buys the milk for bottling and distribution to consumers. At least that's how it works on my neighbor's farm, who sells milk to a regional dairy distributor.