Perception and attitudes of Brazilian livestock advisors towards cow-calf contact in dairy farms

The prolonged cow-calf contact represents a current dilemma faced by the dairy industry, and livestock advisors play an important role in the communication between society and farmers to address the challenges of modern livestock farming. This study aimed to explore Brazilian dairy advisors' perception and attitudes regarding different prolonged cow-calf contact systems. Dairy advisors (n = 236) participated in an online questionnaire containing closed (multiple-choice and 5-points Likert scale) questions regarding attitudes toward prolonged cow-calf contact systems, dairy cattle welfare, and the role of advisors in communicating information between society and the farmers. Participants were randomly assigned to one of 4 cow-calf contact systems, using a 2 × 2 experimental design varying, full or partial contact (C) and full or partial time (T) allowance spent together. Effects of cow-calf contact systems, gender and age on participant attitudes were analyzed using ordinal logistic regression models in RStudio. Participants' gender was balanced (51.3% female and 48.7% male); 48.3% of participants were between 26 to 35 years old, and 43% had a degree in veterinary medicine. Participants' attitudes were generally negative and did not differ across cow-calf contact systems. Also, participants showed negative attitudes toward ease of management and animal health in all cow-calf contact systems. Despite that, participants rated animals' quality of life higher in FullT-FullC and PartT-PartC compared with FullT-PartC and PartT-FullC. Participants showed more favorable attitudes toward cow-calf contact systems in small farms (means ± SE; 2.23 ± 0.9) and those with Zebu cattle (2.25 ± 0.8) rather than bigger farms with European breeds (1.72 ± 0.8). Men were 43% less likely than women to consider discussing these systems relevant, regardless of age. Younger male participants were less likely (P = 0.04) to be positive to cow-calf systems. In conclusion, Brazilian livestock advisors showed negative attitudes toward the prolonged cow-calf contact systems described in this study. Gender and age also influenced participants' attitudes, with younger male participants being less likely to support cow-calf contact. Our findings highlight that, even though new professionals are exposed to animal welfare concepts during their education, this alone is not sufficient to encourage the adoption of practices that address societal values.