Almost 18,000 cattle in 275 holdings

On December 1, 2003, there were 275 holdings with a total of 17,940 heads of cattle, a drop of 830 heads (-4.4 per cent) over the same date the previous year, the National Statistics Office said yesterday.

The survey established that 153 farms (55.6 per cent) are engaged in the "dairy activity" and the total number of cattle in these farms amounted to 16,769 heads, or 93.5 per cent of the total cattle stock. Dairy cows dropped from 8,033 in December 2002 to 7,607 in December 2003.

The other 122 farms, which are not engaged in dairy activity, have a total of 1,171 heads.

The majority of holdings in both Malta and Gozo have a population of 100 or more cattle on the farm. While in Malta 20 per cent of the farms have more than 100 heads on the farm, 34.5 per cent of Gozitan farms have more than 100 cattle on their farms.

In Malta these farms have 8,240 cattle, or 67.7 per cent of the total cattle population, and in Gozo these have 4,211 heads, or 73.1 per cent of the cattle there.