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The overall aim of ROADMAP is to foster transitions towards prudent antimicrobial use (AMU) in animal production in various contexts.ROADMAP's findings have been developed into 8 different policy briefs to aid the identification of levers and incentives for adherence to prudent use principles by veterinarians and farmers. How to promote preventive approaches inveterinary medicine? How to enable farmers to reduceantimicrobial use? Learnings from 12 Living Labs How to consider impact when planning interventions to improve AMU? Intensive Danish pig farming faces structural lock-ins for achieving a prudent AMU How to meet the public health challenge of antibiotic resistance in a context of rapid intensification of poultry production? Improving the use of antimicrobials in the French pig and poultry sectors Recommendations from the Danish Living Lab on AMU in cows and calves from diary herds The policy briefs and all other ROADMAP results are also found on www.roadmap-h2020.eu

Organic dairy farming is based on grazing systems and with a strong focus on health promotion, but many organic farms search for solutions to rely less on imported concentrate feed, as well as the use of antibiotics and anthelminthics. Most calves are removed from their dam one day after birth, despite emphasis on naturalness. GrazyDaiSy was built on the aim to develop innovative, resilient and sustainable organic grazing-based dairy systems, and make a better integration of cows and their calves, e.g. allowing mother-infant contact, and to promote health to minimize anthelminthic and antibiotic use. GrazyDaiSy was based on participatory on-farm research, and used an interdisciplinary approach. The project consisted of four work packages, which were: 1) Novel innovative grazing systems, 2) Sustainable maternal care, bonding and debonding between dam and calf, 3) Effective novel animal health and welfare promotion, and 4) Strategies and practices for resilience in a range of European dairy systems. A cross-cutting focus of GrazyDaiSy was on perceptions, visions, and barriers related to transition and use of novel strategies, as well as their daily practices, mostly focused on CCC systems, but also more broadly. Based on interview with farmers and other actors, perceptions, visions, barriers and experience was analysed in relation to views from the cow, the calf, the system and the human actors, emphasizing nutrition, care and learning aspects of dam-rearing and CCC systems. Case studies and interviews were analysed using change and transition theories in a range from behavioural and motivational individual change to community of practice and larger transition theories, and concluded that all levels of change needs to be considered when making radical systemic changes in well-established dairy sectors. GrazyDaiSy researched the use of semi-natural to natural pastures and the results demonstrated a great potential contribution of the forage on semi-natural to natural pastures to forage (protein) supply to grazing lactating cows on organic dairy farms in Europe. In Estonia, e.g., the share of grass in the diets of lactating cows was estimated to be up to 76.7% of the DM consumed during the grazing season. This depends of course on available pasture area and the extent of its use, and there is a great diversity of organic dairy farms differing in farm size and structure, agro-ecological conditions, and pasture, herd, and grazing management strategies. Timing, farmer strategies and environmental and other conditions influence the outcome. Timely adjustment of the onset and frequency of grazing, of the stocking densities on pastures, as well as of the amount and timing of supplement feeding appear to be valuable options for an improved pasture use, whereas the rotation scheme, the duration of daily pasture access, and the type of supplement feed appeared to be of less importance. Observed climate change related issues such as extreme heat and dry weather, called for urgency and the project team focused particularly on strategies addressing these issues. GrazyDaiSy had a strong focus on rearing calves with the dam for an extended period after calving, compared to the practice in most organic dairy farms. One particular focus was male calves, which should be transferred to a fattening farm. Trials showed that keeping calves until 4 weeks of age with the dam at the dairy farm led to improved weights and immune competence at arrival at the fattening farm. Although dam-rearing weight and immune system advantages did not seem to translate to better health at the fattening farm, these calves benefitted from a reduced prevalence of treatments with medicines. Providing hides on pasture to dairy cows show that cows calving for the first time move further away from herd members at calving, and seemed to prefer to isolate themselves more through distance. Results suggested that hides facilitated maternal bonding. Furthermore, it seemed that dams showed more affiliative behaviour to their calves when having full-time cow-calf contact (CCC), rather than part-time contact, later than 48hrs after calving, and that the bond between cow and calf became stronger when the calf suckled the cow, compared to contact without suckling. Environmental and economic dimensions of sustainability of CCC systems were analysed using models based on data, lining up different scenarios with CCC, and concluding that the higher amount of milk drunk by the calves in these systems, influenced the environmental impact of these systems. However, it also called for a broader focus on systems changes and inclusion of other factors such as animal welfare and biodiversity, and a more combined view on dairy herds as milk and meat producing. In GrazyDaiSy, animal health and welfare promoting strategies were researched through observational case studies, and repeatedly demonstrated the importance of context to analyse problems and find solutions, which allowed for co-learning across countries, until activities were partly interrupted due to Covid-19. The difference in management antibiotics was very big, within the frame of EU organic legislation. A strong focus was on calf and heifer health in innovative dairy systems with nurse cows, based on grazing. Cryptosporidiosis was and identified problem, but seemed to be less serious than traditionally reared calves, especially in the mixed grazing systems, where resistant (nurse cows) and susceptible calves grazed together, and they also seemed to avoid problems with intestinal parasites, and were immunised at the second grazing season when they had spent their summer as young calved on grass.

Under natural conditions, most parturient cows seek visual cover or seclude themselves from the herd when calving becomes imminent. Studies on calving site selection of dairy cows housed indoors show that predominantly older and dominant cows calve in secluded areas offering visual cover. This study aimed to investigate if cows distance themselves further from herd members under spacious outdoor conditions and if artificial hides on a pasture motivate cows to seek visual isolation from the herd.

This presentation summarises some of the changing perspectives of and transitions to cow–calf contact systems, including identifying the challenges and benefits of the various types of systems, in particular dam-rearing and nurse-cow systems. No dairy system in the study countries was initially designed to enable cow–calf contact, but a multitude of systems allowing cow–calf contact have since been developed based on existing farm structures. Interviews and case studies show that the development requires significant changes in practices, attitudes and farm structures, all of which require a lot of investment. Research over the last two to three years in this area has considered several potential ways in which organic dairy systems could encompass forms of cow–calf contact. Whilst on the one hand these studies have acknowledged the ‘naturalness’ of cow and calf systems, including the motivation behind them and the need for the cow and calf to be together, ‘unnatural elements’ have also been highlighted, for example the high milk yields, deep udders and large herd sizes in today’s dairy sector. Some issues remain unresolved and the future organic dairy sector will be required to find further solutions. One major issue is that of male calves, which are often removed from their dam early and in an abrupt way. This raises questions as to whether the current development of dam-rearing and other types of cow–calf contact systems can be seen as niche innovations, or as part of a larger change in the socio-technological landscape around dairy farming and calves. These changes are still ongoing in terms of organising new systems that are friendly and less restrictive for cows and calves, and could potentially be part of a larger transition at the systemic dairy farming level.

The global risk for antimicrobial resistance (AMR) can be reduced by reducing antimicrobial use (AMU). Veterinarians are one of the key actors in relation to AMU in livestock, and understanding the dynamics of veterinary treatment and prescription is central to achieving AMU reduction. Veterinary AMU decisions are influenced by a complex pattern of both individual and contextual factors. In this study, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 16 Danish cattle veterinarians to investigate their perspectives on AMU and current practices in a national context with low use and extensive legal control. We found that personal experiences and emotions, rather than scientific evidence, guided some veterinarians when making AMU choices. Furthermore, less-experienced veterinarians felt pressure to prescribe according to colleagues’ and farmers’ preferences for certain antimicrobials. We found that changes in Danish legislation seemed to have introduced hesitancy and a lack of motivation within the veterinary profession, and that AMR was perceived as an abstract threat not applicable to the veterinarians’ daily professional decision making. We concluded that the lack of field-generated research of local relevance nourished a culture in which AMU choices are built on personal experience rather than scientific evidence, which also diminished newly educated veterinarians’ self-confidence in relation to their AMU choices. Future research should focus on developing locally relevant research on optimal AMU choices and AMR, and the implications of extensive legal control of AMU in livestock farming should be further investigated to find a balance on the path to reducing AMU.

Much research over time has focused on technical improvements without considering possible barriers, lock-ins and motivations to implement the results, apparently ignoring the important influences of structural incentives, socialand societal factors to this. Participatory research emerged in many forms in the 1960s, and partly offered ways of contextually relevant research and implementing. This presentation will focus on how interdisciplinary scienceapproaches (focusing on veterinary, agricultural and social sciences) can foster impacts through innovations in and development of farming and food systems. After having introduced key concepts (‘participation’ a.o.), different levels of impacts on farm, sector, community (including communities of practice (CoPs) and beyond will be explored and discussed, based on experienced examples. Two decades of mainly international research projects will be used as examples, where whole systems are the arenas of change and transition, including Stable Schools, Farmer Family Learning groups, organic farming research, animal health planning research and development, Living Lab involvement, cow-calf contact systems, and research in the meetings between governmental inspectors and farmers. Critical views on the use of the term ‘participation’ will be analysed together with aspects of social learning, social capital building, and Community of Practice theories. Furthermore, potentials to identify context relevant places and levers to intervene in a (farming or food) system, provides an interesting framework which can be unfolded when the body of common experience and learning builds up within and between the involved actors with different backgrounds, interests, and influences. The shared interest and understanding between research partners and other stakeholders to meet current societal challenges such as antimicrobial resistance, animal or human-animal ethical issues, climate change and increasingly broken food systems needs to be present in enabling environments. Interdisciplinary participatory scienceapproaches can facilitate commonality of interests.

Interest in dam-rearing of dairy calves is growing among researchers, advisors and farmers. This internal project report collates, synthesizes and conveys scientific evidence and information on systems for dam-rearing as practiced by farmers in northern Europe. We hope this report will serve as inspiration for researchers planning experiments on dam-rearing as well as advisors and farmers developing and implementing systems for dam-rearing in practice.

Many different poultry breeds are kept by smallholder farmers throughout the world, some of whom are organic or agroecological, although not certified organic in all cases. Many of these breeds are locally adapted, multi-purpose, and indigenous. At a global level, smallholder agroecological or organic poultry flocks contribute to food security, protein supply, and the livelihood of many families, especially women, in many smallholder settings. This chapter introduces organic poultry farming and focusses on ways in which its practices can be improved. The chapter examines poultry as part of ecological systems and cycles and considers how the precautionary principle and concepts of naturalness can be applied to this area. The chapter examines health and disease in organic poultry farming and considers animal welfare aspects, such as fairness and good quality of life. Finally, the chapter looks ahead to future research trends in this area.

This book aims at telling about our common learning in projects in different parts of Uganda, where farmer families and local communities have worked since 2009 to improve their livelihoods and environments based on common learning about organic and agroecological farming, joint efforts for better livelihoods and community development, using the approach of ‘Farmer Family Learning Groups’ (FFLG). This way of working together takes the ‘family approach’: our starting point is whole households working together on each their individual farm. As opposed to the methods where farmer groups work on demonstration farms or demonstration plots, this project is based on groups, which work at each other's individual farms, not focusing on one enterprise, but on building up their entire farming systems. The groups never followed the curricula of any manual directing ‘the one and only right approach’ – they learned together, set their own goals, and worked together in ways which were appropriate in the given geographical, climatic and social context.

Småkalve går i samme flok som de malkende køer i op til 100 dage hos landmand Hans Möller i lentföhrden lige nord for Hamburg.