The production and economic results of dairy farms belonging to the European dairy farmers in 2016

The objectives of the work were to check the possibility of obtaining data from the FADN system for the EDF survey and to compare the economic results achieved by dairy farms from the selected EU countries in 2016. The additional objective was to determine the profitability threshold for milk production at the level of general and full costs. The average data was used for the analysis within EDF and the Polish group and their tercyl separated due to the total cost of milk production. The average national results within EDF in 2016 were also analyzed. Measures for the evaluation of the results was the level of agricultural income, and income from management and risks in the dairy industry. Two break even points of producing 100 kg of milk expressed by total and full costs were also assessed. The lowest total cost of production was incurred by the farm with large scale production, expressed as the number of cows in the herd and milk yield per cow. In addition, these farms were characterised by greater participation of grassland than arable land in forage area, of which more than half was rented. Polish and Irish farms were characterised by the lowest total costs in milk production out of the analyzed countries. Based on the results relying on opportunity costs of own factors in milk production, it should be noted that the Polish farm obtained the lowest entrepreneur income. Apart from Irish farms, milk production in the analyzed countries in 2016 was unprofitable.