Dairy Input Service Delivery System By Lead Farm To Dairy Farmers For The Improvement Of Dairying In Three Zones Of Oromia Ethiopia.

The study was carried out to identify the types dairy input services delivered by various lead farms and assess the role of dairy input service delivery of the lead farms on the dairy farmers in three districts of Oromia region Ethiopia. From Adaa district Alfa Dairy farm Cowgrow and Genesis farm from Welmera district Holetta agricultural Research Center HARC and from Ambo district Gadisa Gobena commercial farm were selected for this study. A total of 196 respondents 98 respondents who received and 98 who did not receive dairy input services were randomly selected with respect to five lead farms and from around lead farm interviewed individually by using semi structured questionnaires. The data collected were analyzed by using SPSS version 20. The results of the study indicate that the dairy input service provision was mainly carried out by private public sector lead farms and perdiem worker veterinarian personnel of different organization. Among these private sector plays a leading role in providing animal feed drug supply and milk marketing. The study results showed that public and a perdiem worker plays a significant role in AI vaccination and treatment service. In cross bred heiferscows service 48.5 and 19.9 were provided by smallholder dairy farmers and lead farms respectively. In general lead farm services consist of feed 7.7 crossbred heifers 26 cows 19.9 bull service 27.1 and milk marketing 19.9 . However there was no designed mechanism to coordinate dairy input service providers for effective delivery of service. It was observed that lack of adequate feed in quantities and quality inappropriate breed treatment disease control and milk marketing were found to be the major constraint hindering dairy production and productivity in the study area. Even though the lead farms played roles in the improvement of dairy sector in general and dairy farmers who received service production performance in particular their service did not improve significantly the dairy production performance in the study area. It could be suggested from the study that any type of dairy input service delivery should go along with provision of improved dairy heiferscows because either feed health or market service alone did not result in any change in the performance of dairy cows. Moreover the dairy input service delivery system by lead farm should be demand driven and participatory to create trust and accelerate the transformation of dairy farmers.