The dairy cattle improvement industry in the United States has recently undergone a major change as it relates to genetic and genomic evaluation services. As with most countries, genetic evaluation services in the United States began as a responsibility and activity of the federal government. More specifically, for several decades now, the Animal Improvement Programs Laboratory (AIPL) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has received and processed data from various sources across the U.S. into a national system, conducted research on a vast array of important topics, established genetic evaluation systems for many traits and computed routine evaluations for bulls and cows in all dairy cattle breeds that were delivered to the industry organizations and producers. During the course of the past few years, the dairy cattle improvement industry in the United States has been restructured commencing with the release of the April 2013 genetic evaluations.
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