Socioeconomic evaluation of feeding strategies and profitability in dual-purpose livestock systems settled in the southwest of the state of Mexico.

The aim of this study was to analyze the effect of feeding management on the socioeconomic performance of dual-purpose cattle production units (PU) in southwest of the State of Mexico. A total of 213 PU located in four municipalities of southwest of the State of Mexico were analyzed. These PU were previously classified through multivariate statistics; PCA (12 variables related to the structure, management and feeding of livestock; KMO = 0.608 with a Bartlett chi-square test of 1367.419 (P < 0.05), four components that explained 74.23% of the total variance of the model) and cluster analysis(using the coordinates of the first four factors obtained from PCA through Ward's method and squared Euclidean distance and the distance cutoff was 200) into four groups according to their feeding management: (i) cow supplementation (G1CS), (ii) semi-intensive (G2SI), (iii) fattening supplementation (G3FS), and (iv) traditional (G4T). Subsequently, social, structural, and economic variables were analyzed using analysis of variance (ANOVA) based on the general linear model (GLM), and Tukey's test was applied for multiple comparisons among groups. No significant differences were observed in most social variables (P > 0.05); however, differences were detected in certain structural variables, as well as in income, costs, and economic indicators (P < 0.05). Feeding represented the main component of production costs across all groups, accounting for up to 70% of total costs (P < 0.05). Group G1CS showed the highest income and economic indicators (P < 0.05), whereas G3FS ranked second in incomes, mainly associated with cattle fattening. In contrast, G2SI registered the lowest economic indicators (P < 0.05), reflecting a limited capacity to generate incomes. Finally, G4T exhibited the lowest costs (P < 0.05) and greater efficiency in the management of its own resources. It is concluded that the economic performance of dual-purpose systems is primarily determined by the efficiency of resource use rather than by the level of intensification or land size.