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Commercial Feasibility of Embryo Transfer Technology: a Case Study¹

Departments of Agricultural Economics and Animal Science, Texas A&M University, College Station 77843 and Department of Animal Science Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853

ABSTRACT

The owner of a 500-cow Holstein herd requested economic assessment of his embryo transfer program. Actual net economic benefit was determined from marginal cost and present value of lifetime milk predicted from first lactations of 24 cows produced by embryo transfer compared with those of their 51 contemporaries sired by artificial insemination. Actual average pregnancy rate was 60% by embryo transfer or AI. An average of 5.5 transferable embryos was obtained per collection, which produced 1.37 cows in first lactation.

Additional milk from embryo transfer cows was from more intensive selection of sires. Additional milk from the donor cows did not differ from zero. Actual marginal cost of a replacement by embryo transfer was $215, but it would have been $200 with same $25/unit semen price as contemporaries. If donors had been from the elite 5% for transmitting ability in milk, present value of gain in milk (5% real interest rate) ignoring additional feed costs would have been less than the cost of embryo transfer. For management and costs similar to this case, embryo transfer is not economically justified for producers earning income primarily from the sale of milk.

¹ Technical Article 22681 of the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station, College Station, TX 77843. A contribution to Southern Regional Project S49, Genetic Methods of Improving Dairy Cattle for the South.

² Texas A&M University.

³ Cornell University.