Smallholder milk-quality awareness in Indonesian dairy farms

In most low-and middle-income countries, milk is produced by smallholders, thereby contributing to the livelihood of their households. With the increasing importance of milk production in these countries, it is essential that milk quality is of a high level to ensure a safe product for consumers. It is, however, unclear whether smallholder dairy farmers are aware of the quality of their milk. The aim of this cross-sectional study was to gain insight on Indonesian smallholder dairy farmer awareness of milk quality parameters and to identify factors associated with the total plate count (TPC) and somatic cell count (SCC). A stratified sampling method was used to select smallholder farms in 4 districts in West Java, Indonesia, that were interviewed between August and September 2017. Factors putatively associated with awareness of TPC were investigated with multinomial regression models, whereas a Firth-type logistic regression was applied to identify factors associated with SCC awareness. Of the total 600 farmers surveyed, 264 (44%), 109 (18%), 170 (28%), 111 (19%), and 23 (4%) farmers were aware of TPC, total solid, fat content, milk density, and SCC, respectively, but did not know its value. Those that were conceptually aware of these quality parameters were generally unaware of their value. Furthermore, this study revealed that the following variables were significantly associated with dairy farmers' awareness of TPC: cooperative to which the farmer belonged, distance to neighboring dairy farmer, technology adoption index, TPC as the most important quality factor for the buyer, milk production information from cooperatives, and cow health information from veterinarians. Similarly, cooperative, dairy business experience, and milk quality test adoption were significantly associated with dairy farmers' awareness of SCC. Cooperative was the only variable that was significant in both final statistical models. This indicates that cooperatives play an important role in increasing farmer awareness of milk quality parameters in these smallholder dairies. This may be valid for other regions in the world also where milk production is dominated by smallholder dairy farmers.