Abstract:
In recent years, sexed semen has been commercially available. Due to its lower fertility
and higher price compared to conventional semen, economic evaluation should be
undertaken before recommending the technology to dairy producers in each country. The
objectives of the present study were to evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of the
sexed semen usage at farm level in economic conditions of Iran based on total net present
value (TNPV) and to estimate the impact of sexed semen on the rate of genetic
improvement in dairy cattle population with and without using genomic information.
Three relative conception rates (RCR) of sexed semen compared to the conventional
semen were assumed i.e. 0.80, 0.75, and 0.70. Visual basic 6 and Excel software were used
for calculations. The results showed that greater numbers of sexed semen services in
heifers resulted in higher TNPV for all assumed RCRs, but for cows in parities 1 and 2,
use of two sexed semen services for RCR, 0.80 and 0.75 resulted in the highest TNPV;
while, for RCR= 0.70, the results indicated that using sexed semen was not economical. By
using traditional evaluation, genomic evaluation with 3k chip, and genomic evaluation
with 50k chip, the additional genetic gains in 305-day milk yield were, respectively,
approximately 25, 34, and 38% higher than the current annual genetic progress for this
trait in Iran (that is, about 53 kg per year).
Keywords: Economic evaluation, Genetic gain, Milk yield, Net present value
