Devising dairy herd management system for "five animal health food safety regulations" at farm level in Japan

在2年的研究期间，我们集中在日本爱知县、千叶县和北海道三个地区进行实地调查。研究目标是通过在奶牛群管理系统中引入/建立HACCP（危害分析和关键控制点）方法，达到农场层面的食品安全标准。该研究的直接目标是开展案例研究，以验证农民参与性研究（不使用药物，而是使用参与性方法）是改善生产力低下/卫生条件差的关键。特别是与千叶NOSAI（牲畜农业互助保险系统）的堀田博士的合作，产生了各种类型的案例研究。例如，一个由NOSAI和动物疾病调查中心的兽医以及地方政府的推广专家组成的小组，重点关注了一个动物健康/生产记录不佳的奶农。农场主、他的家庭成员和雇员采用参与式方法发现和列出问题，公开讨论如何解决这些问题。之后，他们练习了他们认为应该做的事情。乳腺炎和其他疾病的发病率有所下降，产奶量有所增加，工作关系有所改善。换句话说，他们通过改善他们之间的沟通来解决他们的问题，在不使用药物的情况下实现了一定程度的“食品安全”。千叶NOSAI赞扬了堀北博士及其同事的工作，并正式承认这种参与式/沟通方法是他们新的官方职权范围。我们现在打算将我们的研究扩大到国家一级，为开发更好的牛群管理系统提供更多的案例研究。

During 2-year research period, we concentrated on three areas in Japan, Aichi, Chiba and Hokkaido prefectures for field investigation. The research goal was to achieve food-safety standard at the farm level by introducing/establishing HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) method within dairy herd management system. The immediate objective of the research was to conduct case studies verifying that farmer participatory research, which utilize NOT drugs BUT participatory methods, is the key to improve lower productivity/poor hygiene.In particular, collaboration work with Dr.Horikita of Chiba NOSAI (an agriculture mutual insurance system for livestock), produced various types of case studies. For example, a team consisting of veterinarians from NOSAI and animal disease investigation centers, and extension experts of local government, focused on one dairy farmer with poor animal health/production records. Using participatory methods for finding and listing up problems, the farm owner, his family members and employees discussed openly on how to solve such problems. Afterwards, they practiced what they had thought to be done. There were some level of decreases in mastitis and other disease incidence, increase in milk production, and improvement in working relationship. In other words, they managed to solve their problems by improving communication among them and achieved a certain level of "food safety" without using drugs.Chiba NOSAI credited Dr.Horikita and their colleagues' work and officially recognized this participatory/communication approach as their new official terms of reference. We now intend to expand our research to national level for producing more case studies for developing better herd management systems.