ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses that there is absolutely no evidence that ‘they kill the heifers’ and certainly evidence to suggest that killing female stock is actively avoided. It is not denied that at one time female stock probably were slaughtered more frequently. In the beginning farmers did not realise that cattle multiplied much more slowly than pigs, for that was their experience. The high subsidy was also a factor. In addition, the slaughtering of breeding stock was and is encouraged by a fault in project design. Farmers, who were very aware of the monetary value of their cattle, consistently valued heifers at a lower price than bulls, basing their value on weight or carcass value rather than reproductive value, because the cattle were sold to farmers on a weight basis. Thus the wrong signal was sent to farmers from the beginning; heifers should have been priced more highly based on their reproductive value.
