Valores econômicos para as características de produção, funcionais e de fertilidade em sistemas de produção de leite no Sul do Brasil

The objective of this study was to predict the economic values for production, functional and fertility traits, as well as to rank them in order of economic importance for milk production systems in southern Brazil. For this, two clusters were formed according to their production and the characteristics considered were: milk production (MP), lactation persistency (LP), milk fat (FAT), milk protein (PROT), somatic cell count (SCC), age at first calving (AFC), calving interval (CI), feed intake (Intake), mortality (MORT) and cow weight (CW). Revenue was based on the sale of milk, surplus heifers and cull cows and the actual operating costs were used to calculate profit and gross margin. The profit function used to calculate the economic values was based on a 100-cow farm. The average economic values of the characteristics that affect the profit of the producer were in order: FAT: US $ 3,776.07; PROT: US $ 1,888.03; MP US $ 1,258.69, LP: US $ 1,258.69; CW: US $ 124.03; MORT: US $ -14.30; Intake: US $ -614.01; CI: US $ -1,023.62; AFC: US $ -2,724.29; SCC: US $ -3,146.87. Therefore, the economic values calculated for the volume of milk, fertility, milk quality, disease resistance and feed intake addressed that the use of these traits as selection objectives in breeding programmes should result in an increased profitability for the farmer.