The UK Dairy Day Industry Panel 1: The Future of the Dairy Cow

10.30am on first floor in Sharing Knowledge Zone

Chair:
> Grant Hartman, Trebersed Farms Ltd

Panellists

Owain Harries, General Manager, Semex UK 

Owain comes from a pedigree dairy background, where together with his family they manage the Gelli Dairy Shorthorns and Eola Holstein herds in Carmarthenshire, South Wales. Together with being involved with the farm, Owain works as General Manager for Semex UK.

Dan Humphries, Director, Dairy Insight

Dan is a dairy vet/consultant, trainer and communicator. He works with farmers, agri-businesses and throughout the supply chain to improve the future for cows and those who work with them.

John Torrance, Dairy Farmer, Curtismill Holsteins 

John is a third generation farmer and a tenant on the Crown Estate near Romford – only 15 miles from central London. John milks 520 Holstein cows three times a day and operates an indoor system to ensure a level milk supply all year round – having found the dry weather conditions and poor quality of grass in that area are not compatible with a grazing system. John employs a number of full time staff to help run the farm and ensure his cows are professionally looked after.

John is passionate about cow welfare and maintaining high health and safety standards for his workers, and wants to ensure future generations of dairy farmers have a viable future.

Meurig James, Head of Breed Development, NBDC 

From a family farm in Whitland, Meurig was the youngest chairman ever of the old South Wales Holstein Friesian Club and later became President of the Holstein South Wales Club. He then became a member of the Holstein Friesian Society judges panel and has judged at local, County and National shows in different countries. Over recent years he has judged the Dairy Interbreed at the Royal Welsh, Royal Ulster, Royal Cornwall, Royal Norfolk and Great Yorkshire. In 1993 he became a Type Classifier and now holds the position of Head of Breed Development at Holstein UK and Head of NBDC -National Bovine Data Centre. Over recent years Meurig has been heavily involved in setting up Type Classification for several of the Beef Breeds and NBDC now classifies just under 140,000 pedigree and non-pedigree cattle for 19 different Breed Societies and AI companies.  He has represented Holstein UK at seven World Classifiers Workshops and also travelled the World to Shows and different Conferences including a study tour to Argentina to study genetics which was sponsored by the UK Government’s Trade and Industry.   Meurig is also heavily involved with the Royal Welsh Agricultural Society being a Director and member of the Board of Management and also Chairman of the Livestock Committee.

Marco Winters, Head of Animal Genetics, AHDB

Marco Winters is Head of Animal Genetics at AHDB and leads the genetic and genomic evaluations for UK dairy cattle and directs the national breeding goals. Recent work has focused on developing the HealthyCow, Feed Advantage and EnviroCow genetic indexes. He represents the UK’s interest at INTERBULL and is appointed to DEFRA’s UK Genetics for Livestock and Equines Committee (UKGLE.