EU cattle feed as good as stable

In 2016, the EU-28 produced 42,31 million tonnes of cattle feed, an increase of 0.1% over 2015 (42,27 million tonnes). However, the 2016 production of cattle feed varied a lot between EU members.

Of the biggest cattle feed producing countries in the EU, it was seen that the Netherlands and Poland increased their production of cattle feed by 8.6% and 8.0% respectively. Whereas France has seen its cattle feed production fall by 4.4% in all segments, being due either to the shrinking of dairy production after the withdrawal of the dairy quotas or the impact of AI in the South of France in particular. Drops in cattle feed production were also seen in Romania (-34.7%) and Hungary (-7.4%). The production of milk replacers remained relatively stable.

Less feed forecasted for 2017

In total, the EU-28 produced 155.4 million tonnes of compound feed. This is 0.4% more than the volume produced in 2015. For 2017, Fefac expects that the dairy sector still needs to recover from the severe milk price crisis, thereby likely negatively impacting the dairy herd in 2017, while also national adjustments to meet environmental criteria play a role. These developments may lead to a reduction of cattle feed production by 0.5%. With all species combined, it would lead to a 0.5% decrease in compound feed production in 2017 vs. 2016.