Reproduction Abstracts

Introduction: The USA and the Canadian type of Holstein Friesian semens are widely utilized in Japan. However, imported semens from New Zealand (NZ) have started to utilize among some of Hokkaido dairy farmers gradually. The objective of this study is to clarify reasons and acceptability of NZ semen to the Japanese dairy farmers.

Materials and methods: Interviews are held to the NZ semen trading company and nine dairy farmers in Hokkaido, Japan, who are the customers of the firm.

Results and discussion: The main reason of start importing NZ semen by the company is due to the strong consuming request by the dairy farmers who have been to New Zealand. The imported semen is produced by the Livestock Improvement Corporation (LIC). The average herd size of those who wish to purchase NZ semen is 59.2 milking cows and 45.1 ha management land including 13.1 ha grazing land. All of the nine dairy farms graze their cows in paddock which is unique and uncommon in Japan. There are four reasons to introduce NZ semen into their management. i) Improving the fertility. ii) Improving conversion efficiency from grass to milk. iii) Improving cow legs suit for grazing and iv) improving cow body smaller for grazing. There is new movement in Japanese dairy farmers using NZ semen and adopting grazing system to produce low cost fresh milk.