Research Council of Norway
An Innovation project in the industry (IPN)
About the project
This innovation project is owned by Geno
The main aim of this project is to find how we best can reduce the environmental footprint of Norwegian dairy production by breeding. Before a new trait, like methane emission, can be considered included in the breeding goal, research is needed to estimate genetic variation and validate how accurately we can predict the genetic merit of the animals. For this we need measures of methane production for individual Norwegian Red (NR) cows. GreenFeed (www.c-lockinc.com) units for monitoring methane emissions have been installed in 14 selected herds. All cows in these herds are genotyped.
Methane data together with data from the herd’s automatic milking system are now collected routinely to Geno’s database. Establishing data collection and routines for data editing and quality control was the first important milestone in the project. Results so far indicate that there is substantial genetic variation for methane emission in the Norwegian Red breed, and breeding for lower methane is feasible. Further research will focus on developing predictions for methane emissions, estimating genetic associations to other important traits, and examining which trait definitions for methane emissions would be better for successful implementation in the breeding program.
Objectives
Published articles
Published abstracts from scientific congresses and meetings