[Veterinary supervision of dairy facilities in the Netherlands: what do veterinarians think about participating and non-participating cattle owners?].

Dairy herd health and production management programmes are being used increasingly more often, also in the Netherlands. However, little is known about the rationale behind the farmers' decision to participate or not to participate. This paper reports the results of a questionnaire survey among cattle practitioners about why they thought farmers did or did not participate in these programmes, the perceived advantages and disadvantages of such programmes, the extent to which the respective farming areas were represented in the programmes, and the reasons why farmers stopped participation in the programme. Furthermore, the ways in which the practitioners try to convince the non-participating farmers to join the programme were addressed. The future of dairy herd health programmes in the context of quality assurance programmes and the way the farmers think about these developments were discussed by the practitioners.