The largest supermarket chain in the United Kingdom has made social housing of preweaned dairy calves a requirement for its contracted supplier dairy herds.
In 2018, Hertfordshire, England-based Tesco plc mandated that preweaned calves would have to be housed in pair or group housing in its Tesco Sustainable Dairy Group (TSDG) herds as a part of its Livestock Code of Practice and Tesco Welfare Approved (TWA) standards. Producers were given one year to achieve compliance.
At the time, some producers resisted the mandate, and veterinarians were concerned about the potential for increased disease pressure for young calves.
Tesco acknowledged the new standard was a bow to consumer activists critical of the dairy industry’s practice of removing babies from their mothers and placing them in isolation. But the company also noted a large body of research outcomes supporting the benefits of social housing, including:
- Improved cognitive development and adaptability to novel situations.
- Greater ability to withstand stress, particularly during weaning.
- Higher social dominance rank as adult dairy cows.
- Increased starter grain intake.
- Higher average daily gain.
Penn State University researcher Dr. Melissa Cantor discussed the situation on a recent episode of The Dairy Podcast Show. “Tesco was saying, ‘Hey, all this literature is coming out that shows pair housing helps calves, but none of it is showing a benefit to individual housing over paired, including health,’” she stated.
“So, they decided, ‘We’re going to mandate this,’” noted Cantor. “Obviously, the veterinary community was super worried. But now we’ve got all this data coming in from Europe that shows this [social housing] actually can work if we plan it out right.”
Cantor stressed that successful social housing is dependent on excellent management of calf-rearing fundamentals, including colostrum delivery, nutrition, hygiene, ventilation, resting space allocation, and bedding material and maintenance.
Her research also has shown that cross-sucking – a major concern related to social housing – can be significantly minimized when calves receive abundant daily milk allocations of at least 8 quarts/head/day.
Although some Tesco patrons were reluctant to make the switch, producer feedback in the ensuing years indicated many were pleasantly surprised by the results. Among their observations were improved calf vitality; calves snuggling together to rest and stay warm; greater feed competition and intake; increased social and play behavior; and improved natural behavioral development.
The Royal Veterinary College in London conducted a survey of UK dairy farmers about calf management practices that was published in the Journal of Dairy Science in 2022. Feedback from 216 dairy farmers showed that individual calf housing had dropped from about 60% in 2010 to 38% in the current survey.
Only about 12% of the farms in the survey that used pair or group housing reported issues with cross-sucking. And some of the farms in the UK that have recently adopted pair or group housing have done so even though they do not sell milk to Tesco.
Tesco officials noted that their TSDG herds – which initially totaled around 700 in 2018 but now number about 400 – are paid a premium price for their milk via long-term contracts, “providing stability for farmers and allowing them to make long-term investments to become industry leading in animal health and welfare and environmental sustainability.”
Since the social rearing policy was adopted, the company’s market share in the UK grocery landscape has grown every year. As of December 2024, Tesco held 28.1% of the UK grocery market share, its highest in 7 years.
Tesco also received the “Good Dairy Calf Award” from Compassion in World Farming in recognition of the company’s efforts to improve socialization in calf rearing.
In addition to social housing, TWA standards include requirements that animals travel no more than 8 hours from farm to slaughter, and that all food animals must be pre-stunned prior to slaughter. Tesco also requires dairies to perform surveillance and quarterly reporting of lactating-herd data on mobility/lameness; Johnes disease incidence; assisted calvings; hock lesions; and body condition scores.
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