Page 39 - The Welfare of Cattle

16 the WeLfare of CattLe

where mechanization still lags, in addition to the uses listed above, cattle and buffalo remain impor-
tant as power sources for transport and cultivation, competing with human labor and tractors, and
manure is used as a fuel.
We include buffalo along with cattle in our discussion and data. Buffalo are unimportant in
much of the world. However, buffalo comprise a significant share of meat and milk production in
several places, especially in South Asia, which is the largest milk-producing region in the world,
much of it from buffalo (FAO). Where there is no ambiguity, we will use the term “cattle” to include
buffalo.
In most places in the world, the same cattle breed and farms produce both milk and meat.
Main exceptions are North America and some parts of Europe and Oceana where different breeds
are specialized for meat or milk. In North America, for cows of the familiar breeds used for beef,
calves are the only consumers of the milk produced. In all markets, specialized dairy milk breeds
do produce substantial marketable beef from male and cull female calves that enter the beef stream
and from cull cows at the end of their economic life as milk producers.
Specialization between milk and meat is dominant in North America. For example, in the
United States the primary beef cattle industry has no commercial milk production and the dairy
industry receives more than 90 percent of revenue from milk sales. However, even in the United
States, where specialization is the dominant pattern, dairy steers and heifers comprise about 15 per-
cent of the steers and heifers marketed as fed cattle for meat consumption (USDA ERS). Because
milk cows are culled and replaced when they are no longer economically viable and dairy bulls are
replaced as younger bulls come along with higher genetic potential, the two groups comprise about
40 percent of the total cull cattle marketed (USDA NASS).

DIStrIBUtION OF FarMeD BOVINeS aCrOSS reGIONS

Figure 2.1 shows the distribution of cattle and buffalo across regions of the world. About one-
quarter of the total number of animals are found in South Asia, which roughly equals its share of the
world’s human population, and another quarter are found in the area including South and Central

C. Asia + W. Asia E. + Oceania
3% 10%
E. Asia + S.E. Asia Africa
13% 19%

S. Asia North America
25%
6%
South America +
Carib + CA
24%

Figure 2.1 Live bovines, distribution across regions 2014.
Source: http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/QL.