ESCALA DE PRODUÇÃO, PREÇO E CARACTERÍSTICAS DE SISTEMAS PRODUTIVOS LEITEIROS NA REGIÃO DA ALTA PAULISTA, SP

São Paulo is the second largest milk producer in Brazilian Southeast region. Dairy production systems in São Paulo State is heterogeneous. In this way, we aimed to analyzed structural, productive and socioeconomic characteristics of dairy production systems considering different scales of production and the price of the liter of milk paid by the industry. Data of 143 dairy farmers located in the region of Alta Paulista, São Paulo State were analyzed through descriptive statistics and means test (t-test). Three groups of dairy production systems were formed: high, medium and low scale of milk production. Among the groups, there was a difference (p <0.05) for volume, number of lactating cows and productivity per area. Dairy production systems with high production scale presented higher productivity per animal and higher number of lactating cows. However, there were not observed differences between scale of production and price received by farmer in sales to dairy industry.