Analysis of the external influences on livestock research and development set out in Chapter 1 directs ILRI's strategy to 2010. Highlighted are a series of issues and implications (appendix), which fall into three broad categories: 1) researchable issues that are components of the agenda for global livestock research, 2) a subset of researchable issues that will receive priority within ILRI's criteria for beneficiaries, regions and species, and 3) issues and implications that will influence ILRI strategy in implementing its programme.
This chapter indicates how these implications affect ILRI strategies and priorities. It details how they are taken into account to determine how, where, for whom and with whom ILRI should work to achieve maximum impact. They represent a first level of analysis, which focuses on the necessary conditions that must be met if the issues are to be included in ILRI's strategies and priorities. These conditions are the extent to which the issues are researchable, have relevance to the poor and the environment, fall within ILRI's current or potential comparative advantage, are international public goods, and have a suitable role for ILRI.
Analysis of the external influences has indicated which areas of livestock development are researchable and should receive priority. They form the agenda for global livestock research. Within these is the subset of what ILRI will do to make the Livestock Revolution work for the poor. The priorities for ILRI's strategic plan for regions, agro-ecologies, systems and species frame this subset. The interlinked set of seven key research and related areas that has been identified, as listed in Chapter 2, encompasses the broad range of areas essential for sustainable livestock development. They have the potential to produce public goods that will have a significant positive impact on poverty and the environment. They are areas in which ILRI specialises and has its main competence.
ILRI's primary beneficiaries are resource-poor livestock keepers. They include the broad range of smallholder producers, from those endeavoring to subsist on the food and clothing that their livestock and crops produce, to the market-oriented smallholders whose resources are limited but whose production practices are geared towards selling their livestock products to bring them the income they need. One thing that sets the smallholder producers apart—regardless of whether their livestock are kept primarily on common grazing lands or on small farms—is that for-profit research does not serve their needs. Given that in developing countries, these smallholders, especially in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, keep the largest numbers of livestock, for the foreseeable future they need the attention of ILRI and its partners who are publicly supported. The challenge is how to serve them so that they benefit from the opportunities that the Livestock Revolution will create.
In allocating its limited resources, ILRI has set regional priorities—geographical and agro-ecological—that take into account the recommendation domains to which ILRI's research will be directed, regardless of where the research is conducted. The locations where ILRI scientists are based will depend on where there is best access to the problems and to the partners, research facilities and other resources that will increase the probability that research will be successful and have maximum spillovers to other regions.
From the analysis of the external influences as presented in Chapter 1, it is clear that ILRI's research should be primarily targeted at sub-Saharan Africa and Asia (Table 3.1). In these regions are the greatest number of poor and the demand for animal products is growing most rapidly. Additional reasons for focusing on sub-Saharan Africa are that livestock research capability in the NARS is underfunded and needs strengthening, it has the largest potential demand–productivity growth gaps and the CGIAR accords the region special priority.
Table 3.1. External influences on regional priorities for ILRI strategy
External influences |
Regions | |||||
E Asia |
S Asia |
SE Asia |
LAC |
WANA |
SSA | |
Regional demand patterns |
X |
XX |
X |
— |
— |
XX |
Economic importance of animal products in regions |
XX |
XX |
X |
XX |
X |
X |
Regional distribution of the poor |
— |
XX |
— |
— |
— |
XX |
CGIAR priorities and strategies |
X |
X |
X |
X |
X |
XX |
Gaps between projected demand and recent productivity growth rates |
— |
— |
X |
— |
— |
XX |
Need to strengthen NARS capacity for livestock research |
— |
— |
— |
— |
— |
XX |
LAC–Latin America and the Caribbean; WANA – West Asia and North Africa; SSA – sub-Saharan Africa Cells marked XX indicate the external influence is highly relevant in the region; X indicates the influence has significant relevance; cells with a dash (—) indicate only incidental relevance.
Because of its global mandate, ILRI will not neglect the regions of Latin America and the Caribbean, or of West Asia and North Africa, including Central Asia and the Caucasus, all of which have important livestock sectors with compelling and urgent research priorities. To respond to these demands, ILRI will identify opportunities and partners that complement and add value to research on topics of high priority for sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. Research in other regions will be funded through relevant national and regional sources. For example, in South Asia, as there are NARS with a strong capability for livestock research, ILRI's role will be mainly catalytic and facilitative.
The majority of rural poor in developing countries are mixed crop–livestock farmers in the humid/subhumid and the arid/semi-arid tropics and subtropics (see Figure 1.2). These mixed systems will be the primary targets for ILRI's research. It will give secondary attention to systems in the mixed temperate and tropical highlands and the arid grasslands, and finally, limited attention to the temperate arid highlands, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa, and to the industrial systems. A transect approach will consider spillover effects from one agro-ecoregion to another, as they have strong social, economic and environmental interactions.
Research on mixed crop–livestock systems should achieve the greatest impact on poverty reduction and food security and respond most strongly to NARS priorities (Table 3.2 and Figure 1.2). Due to expanding populations on fixed land areas, the need of smallholder crop–livestock farmers for options that will promote sustainable intensification is urgent. ILRI's research agenda will assess the links between evolving production systems, such as between smallholder and large-scale grazing and mixed systems in sub-Saharan Africa. It will look at the possibility of area-wide integration of specialised crop–livestock systems.
Table 3.2. External influences on system priorities for ILRI's strategy
External influences |
Livestock production systems | ||
Grassland |
Crop–livestock |
Industrial | |
Demand growth |
— |
X |
XX |
Economic importance of animal products in systems |
— |
XX |
X |
System distribution of the poor |
— |
XX |
X |
Making the Livestock Revolution work for the poor |
— |
XX |
X |
CGIAR special emphasis on sub-Saharan Africa |
X |
X |
— |
NARS priorities |
X |
XX |
— |
Livestock and the environment |
XX |
X |
XX |
Livestock and human health |
— |
— |
X |
Value of animal and plant biodiversity |
X |
X |
— |
ILRI emphasis on international public goods and its comparative advantage |
X |
X |
— |
Cells marked XX indicate the external influence is highly relevant in the system; X indicates the influence has significant relevance; cells with a dash (—) indicate only incidental relevance.
ILRI's partnerships will mean that broader research will be possible in production-to-consumption systems, particularly in dairying. The partnerships will involve the latest techniques in participatory research, market analysis, geographic information systems and other areas in which NARS want to collaborate. These partnerships will also make possible policy analysis and technology.
Environmental issues, biodiversity and related policy questions provide the major rationale for a focus on the grassland systems. ILRI has no comparative advantage to offer the industrial systems; its major contribution to them lies in research on environmental and related policy issues such as their impact on soil, groundwater and atmospheric pollution. Such issues will loom even larger in the future as these systems respond to the rapidly increasing demands for livestock products as a result of growth in incomes and urbanisation.
The economic importance of species and the future demand growth suggest that cattle, buffalo, pigs and poultry assume priority over sheep and goats (Table 3.3). However, because of their lower value per head and shorter generation intervals, sheep, goats and also poultry have special relevance for the poor.
Table 3.3. External influences on species priorities for ILRI's strategy
External influence |
Species | ||||
Cattle |
Buffalo |
Sheep & goats |
Pigs |
Poultry | |
Demand growth |
XX |
XX |
X |
XX |
XX |
Gaps between projected demand and recent productivity growth rates |
XX |
X |
— |
X |
XX |
NARS priorities |
XX |
X |
X |
XX |
XX |
Economic importance of species |
XX |
XX |
X |
XX |
XX |
Importance of species to resource-poor livestock keepers |
X |
X |
XX |
X |
XX |
Cells marked XX indicate the external influence is highly relevant for that species; X indicates the influence has significant relevance; cells with a dash (—) indicate only incidental relevance..
In sub-Saharan Africa, ILRI will focus on ruminants. The countries in this region can incur large opportunity costs to the rest of the economy if they import feed grains to support the intensive pig and poultry industries. Smallholders will continue to rely primarily on forages and crop residues for improved cattle, sheep and goat production
As monogastrics in sub-Saharan Africa have an important role in food security and poverty reduction, their contribution to farm income and household nutrition will be assessed within the context of a small farm. Pigs and poultry will be increasingly important in Asia. But since technology for industrialised pig and poultry production is readily transferable from developed countries, ILRI will primarily focus on policy, environment and farming systems that are peculiar to developing countries and that have particular impact on the poor.
ILRI has ready access to tropically adapted forage and browse species, as Africa has the world's greatest diversity of wild and domesticated ruminants and their rumen microflora—an advantage when working to overcome ever-present feed constraints that exist in developing countries. ILRI is also well positioned to apply biotechnology and genomics to global livestock production and health problems.
Within the discovery-to-delivery-to-impact continuum, ILRI's most effective contributions will be through strategic research. Developed country providers are generally better financed and equipped to carry out more basic research, whereas developing country providers, because of their closer contacts with the end users, are usually better placed to handle the more applied and adaptive aspects.
The direct investments in ILRI's programmes are small compared with investments in national and other research institutions. For the CGIAR as a whole, the putative share is 4% of the total investment in national and international agricultural research. The proportions for international livestock research are probably lower, given the relative emphasis of the CGIAR on crop agriculture. Therefore, it is essential that through careful design of research, full advantage is gained from the links and synergies within ILRI and among its partners, as indicated in Figures 3.1 and 3.2, if maximum and measurable impact from investments in livestock research is to be
realised.
Figure 3.1. Synergistic links among the key research areas that will have an impact on livestock production systems.
Figure 3.2. Pathways to desired impacts for ILRI research and related activities.
The goals, priorities and plans of the regional associations of NARS will heavily influence how ILRI will work. This will be particularly true in sub-Saharan Africa, where ILRI will be a principal contributor in the new strategy for the CGIAR in the region. The strategy is being developed with African NARS, subregional organisations, the Special Program for African Agricultural Research (SPAAR) and the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA).
To address the seven key areas and 13 strategic approaches that ILRI has identified (see Section 2.3 and Table 2.1) calls for a systems approach to setting priorities, designing experiments, and delivering and evaluating research products.
Results from research will be evaluated in net impact on broader systems, considering interactions of the livestock component with other components. Interacting components of smallholder production systems include soil, water, crops, as well as livestock, wildlife and humans. Important livestock-related policy issues bear on how productive and sustainable the system will be. ILRI will follow a holistic production-to-consumption system approach to livestock development-oriented research. In doing so, ILRI will take account of end-user needs and preferences as well as market and institutional factors affecting delivery and adoption.
This holistic approach implies broad research needs—beyond ILRI's capacity. Thus ILRI will rely on partnerships and alliances to optimise the use of resources. ILRI's appropriate roles in its seven key areas are addressed in Sections 3.5 and 4.2. Integrating them is
Generating interventions are
Strengthening capacity for livestock research threads through all six of these research areas, as it is essential if national partners are going to be able to deliver research to resource-poor livestock keepers.
Three of the research areas designed to generate interventions—feeds, health and genetics—directly address the livestock component; policy and the environment address livestock-related issues such as natural resource management in agricultural systems. There are significant synergistic links among these areas. For example, livestock health improvement will in future adopt an integrated approach to disease management. This means integrating disease control with improved animal nutrition, genetics and other approaches that will improve animal health—on the farm and in the nation or region. ILRI's recognised comparative advantage in epidemiology and systems analysis will be essential ingredients in this approach.
In other links, shared facilities for biotechnology, genomics and bioinformatics directly contribute to ILRI's research in rumen ecology, genetics of disease resistance, identification of candidate antigens for vaccines, and characterisation of genetic resources of indigenous animals and forages.
The role of livestock in rapidly evolving and complex agricultural systems is highly interactive with other agro-ecological, biotechnical and socio-economic elements of the system. The long production cycle for livestock, especially large ruminants, adds to the complexity of these interactions. The strategic decision to follow a systems approach, embracing the discovery-to-delivery-to-impact continuum, means that the consequences of research-based interventions must be measured in net impact. The databases, models and methodologies essential for assessing impact—including the ex ante assessments needed for priority setting—are poorly developed for livestock as compared with crop systems. In particular, methods for analysing the interaction of the livestock component with other components of a system are not well developed for smallholder systems in developing countries.
Significant advances in informatics, including GIS, and computing capabilities enable the development of models and methods that can address the complexities of the livestock component of agricultural systems. Improvements have been made in the databases required for livestock systems analysis, including livestock census, production statistics, disease incidence, price and trade data, and environmental factors. Systems models and analytical methods will contribute to the design of research into component and production systems and, in turn, will benefit from the additional primary data the research generates on the household, community, watershed and region.
The primary clients for the outputs will be policy-makers, planners and analysts in national and international agencies who are concerned with and responsible for sectoral R&D investments involving livestock. Methodologies such as analytical models and decision-support tools will be conveyed to analysts and planners by publications, training modules and visiting fellow arrangements. Policy-makers will be exposed to the outputs by way of conferences, seminars and symposia, as well as policy briefs and other publications. Databases will be made available to collaborators and clients as required.
Systems analysis and impact assessment research are closely linked with other research activities by drawing on primary data from them and applying models and methodologies, using impact assessment for priority setting, and developing decision-support models and data for informed policy-making.
The strategic research embodied in systems analysis and impact assessment will help ensure that research investments support the highest priority activities and that the results will alleviate the needs of resource-poor livestock keepers and consumers. This will help ensure larger economic and environmental impact in a shorter time.
Quantity and quality of feed supply are generally the first limiting constraints to livestock productivity in developing countries. Undernutrition limits yield of meat and milk to a fraction of genetic potential and increases the animal's susceptibility to disease and parasites. Monogastrics are particularly sensitive to nutrient quality and balance, especially under intensive-confinement production systems. The significant increase in monogastric meat production projected in the Livestock Revolution will depend on balanced concentrate rations of starchy staples, proteins and essential micronutrients. These ingredients are essentially the same as those required by humans, so there is potential competition, especially for coarse grains, with poor consumers. For ruminants, major constraints arise from seasonal shortages and from poor digestibility of fibrous feeds including forages and crop residues. Many tropical plants have evolved phytochemical and structural protection against pests and predators, including wild and domesticated herbivores. These antinutritional factors include toxins and indigestible structural materials. Considerable research has been conducted in the tropics on feed supply and utilisation. Still, smallholder adoption of the resultant technologies has been limited. Reasons have been lack of a holistic approach to link farmers' circumstances with alternative solutions, lack of a systematic research effort in seeking alternatives, and inadequate knowledge of the physiological response of animals to seasonal fluctuations in feed supply.
Advances in science and links with ecoregional research open the way for a more holistic approach to research on feed resources. A principal strategic research opportunity is to characterise the nutrition of starchy staples, forages and protein sources that monogastrics may use, and tropical forages and crop residues that ruminants may use. Knowledge of the genetic basis for toxic and structural antinutritional phytochemicals can be used in plant breeding programmes. Knowledge of the physiological response by animals, including rumen microbes, to antinutritional factors can be used to develop interventions to detoxify and improve the digestibility of feeds, including tropical forages. These opportunities are manifested in the area of rumen ecology as it addresses the nutritional nexus of tropical plant–ruminant–rumen microbes. Characterising the phytochemistry of indigenous tropical forages, trees and shrubs is also important in designing strategies for sustainable in situ conservation under natural grazing pressures.
A principal opportunity is to develop cost-effective rations from locally available, low-cost feed sources that will give the required levels of performance. The general principles underpinning development of appropriate rations draw on the well-established knowledge of the metabolic requirements of monogastric and ruminant livestock in temperate regions. However, under tropical conditions, in which livestock may be subjected to periods of severe feed scarcity or surplus within and between years, much less is known about the way animals adapt physiologically and how their performance reflects the way they compensate. An understanding of these processes will lead to better-designed feeding under field conditions. National research providers have a comparative advantage in the adaptive research problem of developing rations for specific locales.
Collaboration with international centres involved in crop and forage improvement will be used to ensure traits of value to livestock are built into their genetic improvement programmes. Collaboration with farming and production systems programmes of NARS, NGOs and farmer associations in priority regions will help ensure innovations that improve feed utilisation are assessed in a holistic and participatory manner to enhance the prospects of adoption and impact.
The nutritional status of livestock has a direct bearing on animals' resistance to disease and parasites and therefore is a key element addressed in epidemiological research. Feed sources, including tropical forages, and their utilisation are interlinked with research to improve systems productivity through nutrient cycling and integrated natural resource management. Use of feeding strategies is dependent upon the existence of markets for inputs and outputs, which is a key constraint addressed by policy research.
Improving utilisation of feed resources will reduce wastage and will increase meat and milk yields. The more cost-effective production will benefit producers and consumers alike. Using fodder banks and other agroforestry systems to supply leguminous forage and tree species for feed will improve soil fertility and increase the sustainability of mixed crop–livestock systems. By focusing specifically on low-quality, fibrous crop residues and fodders, the programme will be of specific relevance to resource-poor smallholder farmers in marginal areas, who do not have access to high-quality feed concentrates. This research will be especially important for the semi-arid and subhumid zones, as roughages in these zones are particularly high in fibre content. Improving the feed utilisation of these low-quality fodders will also benefit the environment, as it will reduce the need for feeds with a cereal-grain base. As high fibre content is typically a tropical environment problem, the private sector is not interested in addressing it, because the market for the biotechnology is limited.
Animal diseases are principal constraints to smallholder livestock production in the developing world. High incidence of disease can dramatically reduce productivity, and risk of disease restricts further investment and intensification in livestock production. Smallholder livestock keepers may fail to effectively manage livestock disease—because existing disease control technologies are not appropriately designed or properly applied or are not made available, or because appropriate technologies have yet to be developed. To address these needs, research managers and development planners must have more accurate information on the extent of livestock diseases and their impact on the economy, poverty and the environment. Such information, which is currently lacking, is necessary for research to best target national and international disease control interventions and make optimal use of scarce funding resources.
While many of the epidemic diseases have been controlled through the vaccines that are now available, endemic diseases continue to cause severe economic losses through morbidity and mortality. These diseases include the infections caused by vector-borne haemoparasites and helminths. A number of existing technologies, such as chemotherapeutic agents and live vaccines that were previously successful in controlling these diseases, are no longer effective—because of acquired resistance or weakened delivery services. Appropriately designed alternatives are often lacking. The situation is exacerbated by lack of interest in the developed world to support research in diseases specific to the tropics due to poor returns on investment. With the further globalisation of livestock trade and trade regulations, tropical diseases will increasingly block opportunities for trade.
Advances in epidemiology and systems analysis are making it possible to better understand and describe the spatial and temporal distribution of animal diseases. This knowledge means that research efforts and control interventions devoted to both ruminant and non-ruminant livestock diseases can be rationalized, based on the important bearing these diseases have on tropical ecology and socio-economics.
Globally, this approach can be used to develop geographic information systems (GIS) that integrate available information on the extent and impact of livestock diseases and, combined with other existing databases on ecological and socioeconomic factors, to generate global disease databases. Such information systems will improve the setting of research priorities, in selecting species, diseases and production systems, and they will serve as the basis for economic analyses of the benefits of control interventions. The information systems will need to be further refined using improved epidemiological tools and models based on case studies in key production systems.
The need is particularly urgent to improve capacity of national governments to make decisions regarding cost-effective monitoring and control of the diseases that affect livestock trade, particularly in the context of the globalised regulation of world trade. Developing appropriate tools to help make and support these kinds of decisions will further the growing interaction between economic and epidemiological tools.
Existing methods, particularly chemotherapeutic agents and live vaccines, have been successfully used to control endemic diseases in defined farming systems. Immediate opportunities exist, with relatively small investment in research, to improve these agents and repackage them for effective delivery to smallholder livestock keepers. In addition, a number of new and exciting developments in the field of biotechnology are relevant to disease problems that as yet lack appropriate technologies. Exploiting the knowledge derived from microbial sequencing projects and linking it with bioinformatics will present opportunities to identify novel applications for drugs and new diagnostic tools and vaccine candidates.
These approaches, in combination with improved knowledge of immunology and host–parasite interactions, will engender a more rational approach towards developing a number of new products that help control these diseases. In particular, the diagnostic tools will be used to generate epidemiological knowledge and evaluate the impact of interventions, while the vaccines will be used to artificially enhance population immunity. These products will be adapted based on information gained by concurrent research in disease epidemiology. Appropriate technologies and their delivery will be designed as components of integrated disease control.
The primary clients for the outputs are national and international agencies responsible for veterinary policies, priorities and services in developing countries. Methodologies such as decision-support tools, databases and disease priority assessments will be conveyed to analysts and planners by publications, training modules and visiting fellow arrangements. Policy-makers will be exposed to the outputs by way of conferences, seminars and symposia, as well as policy briefs and other publications. The private sector, national veterinary services and NGOs will be the primary delivery pathways for drugs, vaccines and diagnostics. However, ILRI may have to be proactive in orchestrating novel intellectual property and public funding arrangements to position technologies for control of orphan animal diseases—the diseases in developing countries for which treatment may not be commercially viable. In this way, ILRI can help make it possible for the private sector to develop appropriate products and smallholder livestock keepers to adopt them.
These research efforts will lead to the development of animal disease control technologies and improved understanding of scientific relationships—including vaccine development, genetics of resistance, and nutrition–disease interactions—thus guiding priorities to ensure their relevance while incorporating advances in diagnostics to improve epidemiological tools. The research will also build upon and reinforce similar activities in the area of systems analysis and impact assessment by using a common approach and integrating the epidemiological dimension. The global information systems and focus on diseases of trade will benefit and interact with the work on livestock policy.
Development of new technologies emanating from this area are linked with livestock genetics and genomics research and with human health research. Disease problems are closely associated with a number of other external factors; therefore, the effective deployment of integrated control strategies relies on links with epidemiology, nutrition, production systems and policy research.
Integrated control of economically important diseases by better use of new and existing technologies such as vaccines will reduce morbidity and mortality and increase production and income of resource-poor livestock keepers. The reduced wastage of animals will have a major effect on overall food conversion efficiency, reducing pressure on scarce grazing lands and feed-grain supplies. This will indirectly benefit the poor who consume the same food grains, relying on them as a staple food.
The focus of the programme on decision-support systems for national animal health policies, on vaccines that are robust, efficacious and safe yet cheap, and on diagnostic tools is especially relevant for the poor. Current national policies often give priority to clinical treatment and disease control of exotic animals, which are beyond the reach of the poor. Policy research, which can identify appropriate alternative delivery systems for the poor, will be a key factor in reducing poverty. Similarly, the focus on thermostable vaccines and simple diagnostics is of direct importance for such alternative delivery systems, as it will provide safe disease control for the poor in remote and marginal areas, where veterinary infrastructure is often deficient. Finally, the focus on vaccines will reduce the current reliance on antibiotics and insecticides, and thus reduce the environmental and public health hazards of current chemical-based controls.
Of the world's animal genetic resources (AnGR), which comprise some 40 species and 3800 breeds (including poultry), one-third are at risk of extinction, and 60% of this third are in developing countries. The greatest diversity of AnGR is found in Asia and Africa, and these regions also contain the highest percentage of AnGR at risk of loss. By far the greatest cause of genetic erosion is the growing global trend for reliance on a handful of modern breeds best suited for the high input–output needs of industrial agriculture. This narrow selectivity results in reducing the biodiversity available for future production demands. It is largely unknown which breeds harbour significant genetic diversity and thus which need to be conserved. The problem is made more acute because there are no methods for valuing AnGR and thus make informed decisions about conservation. Breeds currently not making any significant economic contribution may be reservoirs of unique genes with substantial potential for use in unknown future environments. Furthermore, little information exists on production and adaptive qualities of most of the AnGR in developing countries. Consequently, breeds that could potentially make important contributions to sustainable livestock production continue to be underutilised and are increasingly at risk of being lost.
In general, indigenous livestock in the developing world yield less milk, meat and other products per head than those in the developed world, where annual genetic gains of 1% or more of the breed average in milk production in dairy cattle and some 0.5% in growth to one year of age in beef cattle have been achieved over the last two decades through genetic improvement focused on a small number of breeds. Transplanting genetic improvement programmes from developed to developing countries, especially tropical regions, has often not been successful, and frequently, imported exotics have not reproduced or survived as well as locally adapted breeds. Negative correlations between productive traits (for example, milk yields) and adaptive ones (for example, tick resistance) highlight the importance of genetic characterisation. The optimum genetic improvement strategy will vary according to species, breed and production system. Progress will depend on availability of adapted indigenous AnGR. In addition to productivity, in many instances the strategy will have to consider adaptation and a wide range of functions performed by indigenous livestock in these production systems.
Animal genetic resources have evolved in diverse environments, largely through natural selection. These unique combinations of genes define not only productive qualities but also adaptive capability. They possess valuable traits such as disease resistance, adaptation to harsh environments and ability to use low-quality feed—all desirable qualities for achieving sustainable agriculture under low-input conditions. It is estimated that 50% of the biological diversity, in cattle, for example, is among breeds, and the rest within breeds. Rapid advances in molecular genetics make possible a better understanding of the nature of genetic diversity at the molecular level, enabling the widespread exploitation of useful genes in new breeds suited to future needs.
The Convention on Biological Diversity is a significant landmark among international agreements, and countries that have ratified it are committed to managing their biological resources, including livestock. A fundamental component of this management process is surveying and characterising AnGR, with the objective of conserving and using these resources better.
Methodologies developed for economic valuation and quantitative and molecular genetic characterisation of indigenous stock under normal production conditions will be generally applicable across regions and across systems that will include indigenous breeds of swine, poultry and camelids.
Although traits contributing to adaptation are generally much more difficult to measure and change than are production traits, genetic improvement using genomics as a tool makes it possible to introduce, for example, genes conferring disease resistance into highly productive but susceptible stock. Computer simulation and a murine model developed at ILRI will aid in applying such techniques as marker-assisted introgression to produce livestock that are productive and also better adapted. Alternatively, based on the relative importance of adaptation to harsh environments, a superior strategy may be to develop the production traits in breeds that are already adapted. Genes conferring disease resistance harboured in indigenous AnGR also provide the opportunity to study the regulation and expression of genes to evaluate them as potential targets for therapeutic intervention or vaccine development.
Methods to value AnGR and molecular tools to characterise indigenous breeds harbouring genetic diversity will make it possible to identify indigenous AnGR for which conservation and use strategies should be targeted.
Genetic information and methodologies will be provided to NARS breeding programmes in publications and in seminars, conferences, symposia and training programmes to facilitate their use in livestock breeding programmes. Genes and quantitative trait loci for desirable traits will be made available to NARS and the private sector from nucleus herds and flocks using artificial insemination and other technologies.
Links are in the areas of genomics research focused on vaccine development; integrated disease control; strengthening of knowledge and skills of NARS to develop and implement genetic improvement strategies; understanding of indigenous knowledge in relation to AnGR, to improve productivity and natural resource management of livestock production systems; and use of feed resources to improve productivity.
Characterisation and economic valuation will bring about cost-effective conservation of indigenous animal biodiversity, providing the basis for a wider selection of genetic material that can be exploited to adapt to changing production and market conditions for the benefit of smallholders.
The conservation of local AnGR will directly benefit resource-poor livestock keepers, for whom importing exotic breeds is not an option, because they cannot afford the high-management inputs such imported livestock require, or the harsh environment they live in is suitable only for locally adapted breeds. Similarly, the introduction of disease-resistant characteristics will reduce the reliance on outside inputs, which would benefit the poor and the environment. Conserving domestic biodiversity is now considered critically important for sustaining future production systems. The strong shift towards industrial forms of livestock production has meant the use of only a limited number of homogeneous livestock breeds, and thus it is causing a further erosion of domestic animal genetic resources. Identifying effective means of conserving this biodiversity therefore will be directly beneficial to resource-poor farmers and the environment, both now and in the future.
Too often policies and regulations actually discourage development of safe, sustainable livestock production systems and practices that benefit the poor. Subsidies and price controls imposed on input and output markets may favour large-scale or developed country producers over smallholders in developing countries and urban consumers over rural livestock producers. Inadequate or inappropriate property rights and environmental policies are disincentives that work against protecting the natural resource base supporting animal agriculture, and they may fail to take adequate account of the societal costs of environmental degradation. Lack of policies and institutions that reduce risk, improve market access, provide credit, encourage private investment in livestock services (feeds, health, breeding) and support livestock research and extension deter sustainable livestock development.
The more coherent and transparent a livestock policy framework, the clearer will be the signals it sends to stakeholder and the more effective and efficient will be decisions by these stakeholders in contributing to livestock development objectives. Crucial to such coherence any transparency in livestock policy analysis is building an understanding of how alternative strategies towards the livestock sector affect complementarities and trade offs among the different social and economic development objectives. Rigorous policy analysis is particularly important in gaining purchase to key trends in livestock development, which is central to ILRI's research portfolio. Trends and developments to watch include
Clear insights into the causes and consequences of these trends and developments will improve prospects for policies that encourage sustainable livestock development while benefiting the poor. ILRI's policy research will bring to bear economic, institutional, sociological and anthropological analysis of these issues. An important strength that ILRI has is the ability to incorporate in-house livestock expertise into policy analysis, thereby improving the technical relevance of policy outputs. Other opportunities supporting ILRI's contribution to livestock policy research include access to primary data from research in households and farms across regions, participation in ecoregional consortia addressing natural resource management and systems productivity, and close links with the international Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and other international agencies noted for policy research.
Policy-makers and their advisers and analysts in national governments and those in international development agencies will form the primary clientele for the research outputs. Policy briefs, other publications and consultations will inform policymakers; conferences, seminars, symposia and training programmes will be used to relate to their advisers and policy analysts.
Policy-related constraints on livestock development touch on all aspects of ILRI's integrated research programme. Policy research outputs thus will support a wide range of activities within the institute and will so assist in improving impact of ILRI's technology development activities. Similarly, expertise from other ILRI units will be brought into policy research as needed. As an international non-profit institute, ILRI is well placed to catalyse and support NARS policy analysts to conduct studies that cut across country borders on the effects of adopting alternative livestock-related policies.
Improved regional and global databases will make it easier to identify problems and analyse comparative policy options. Greater participation of stakeholders in policy research will shorten the period between discovery, delivery and dissemination. Comparative market analysis will support informed reform of these markets using best practices. New and targeted policy options will improve natural resource management.
Having information on livestock, poverty and the environment readily available will be a direct aid to national and international decision-makers as they allocate resources. Such information will also be critically important in empowering the poor in producer organisations and in enabling them to engage in policy dialogue with their governments. Of special importance for the poor will be the emphasis on technology delivery; because traditional forms of technology dissemination are not effective, new and innovative approaches are necessary. Finally, the focus of this programme on the link between policy, livestock and environmental degradation will help to ensure that future production systems are sustainable.
increased demand for livestock products will place increased pressure on the natural resources supporting livestock production. Population pressures, both human and livestock, will bring increased competition for land use. Such competition can lead to pollution, erosion, degradation, and loss of plant and animal biodiversity, including wildlife. In the more extensive systems of grazing and mixed livestock, competition for resources affects the crop–livestock land-use choices of smallholders and increases pressure to convert forested lands to pasture and crops. Little is known about the causes and consequences of livestock-related problems for natural resource management in evolving systems. Trade-offs between increasing income and food security for poor people in the short term and conserving natural resources to serve longer-term needs are not well understood. This lack of knowledge hinders development of effective interventions and strategies to improve livestock-related natural resource management to increase productivity of mixed and grazing systems. Industrial and peri-urban systems generate pollution that adversely affects urban land and water resources, often to the particular detriment of the poor. Such systems also represent an increased risk of zoonotic diseases. Failure to quantify these environmental and public health externalities may give large-scale producers unfair economic advantage over smallholders.
Integrated approaches to natural resource management will promote sustainable increases in productivity of livestock in agro-ecosystems. Livestock can enhance the natural resource base by improving soil quality, increasing the value of plant and animal biodiversity, and providing the draft power for shaping land to control soil erosion and protect water resources. Improving nutrient availability and utilisation through balanced and efficient use of organic and inorganic nutrients is the key to sustainable mixed-farming systems. In local communities, livestock keepers need better and more appropriate technologies and management practices to conserve the natural resources. For example, crop residues, forages and supplements need to be better used to increase livestock productivity. Good-quality manure and better nutrient cycling will improve soil fertility and crop output. When livestock improve ecosystems, these management successes need to be applied to other ecosystems.
Better policies can promote environmental conservation and at the same time permit farmers to achieve their aspirations for short-term gains. Knowledge is needed to understand the connections between poverty, livestock and the environment—locally, regionally and globally. This will lead to the design of policies to make livestock productivity compatible with environmental enhancement. As urbanisation increases and production systems intensify, the negative effects of pollution and health hazards need to be removed by relocating industrial and intensive livestock production systems away from urban centres. The concept of area-wide integration of specialised crop and livestock systems to meet market demands and protect the environment thus becomes relevant.
The primary clients for the outputs are policy-makers, advisers, planners and analysts in national governments and international agencies responsible for establishing environmental policies and regulations in regions and ecologies where livestock and wildlife are important. Policy briefs and other publications will provide vehicles to inform policy-makers; conferences, seminars, symposia and training programmes will be used to relate to advisers and analysts.
Research on livestock-related integrated natural resource management will link closely to the research of other CGIAR centres and their partners in ecoregional consortia. Within ILRI, this research will link with research on feed resources, biodiversity, land-use and environmental policy, systems analysis and, especially, with field research on production-to-consumption systems.
The programme will focus on production systems and environments of particular relevance to the poor. By focusing on mixed systems, it will cater for the large majority of poor smallholders in the developing world. Effective management of nutrient flows will be of direct benefit to the poor and the environment, as it will reduce the dependence on inorganic inputs. The focus of natural resource management work on rainfed, often marginal environments is directly relevant to the poor. The combined technological and institutional focus of this programme ensures that critical issues of access to resources—one of the main causes of the poverty trap that holds millions of smallholders—will be addressed. The particular focus on area-wide integration with industrial production will identify how the environmental costs of large industrial units can be internalised, and thereby mitigate the crowding out of smallholders because of unfair competition from these large units.
The previous six key areas have all been in research. Capacity strengthening cuts across all and is essential to all. For without knowledge of the research results, without the ability to make use of them and disseminate them, the research itself will be of little benefit to the poor for whom they are intended. Capacity strengthening here is subdivided into two categories—gathering and disseminating information and building local and regional capacity.
Information. Ready access to relevant, systematic data, information and knowledge is a prerequisite for effective livestock R&D. It is essential that such a flow from ILRI's research be made readily available so that it can benefit resource-poor livestock keepers and achieve the intended impact. Currently many NARS lack ready access to information systems where they can both acquire the information they need and disseminate the products of their own research.
Capacity. Throughout much of the developing world, national institutions are unable to adequately address issues critical for livestock R&D. Much of this inability is due to the lack of skilled human resources and adequate financial resources. This problem will worsen over the coming 10 years as NARS address the huge increases in food production needed from livestock. To meet this demand, NARS will need skills to solve complex problems and to successfully use systems research and the new sciences. Whether many developing country universities have the ability to train enough researchers in these areas is a growing concern. Moreover, ILRI needs partners to effectively fulfil its research mandate, and the most important partners will continue to be NARS scientists and institutes.
Information. Recent and anticipated developments in information and communication technologies offer the possibility of quick, global dissemination of information in multiple forms. Information will play an increasingly important role in improving the links between livestock research, extension and technology transfer. Present trends indicate that in 10 years, most if not all developing countries, even in sub-Saharan Africa, will have access to these technologies.
ILRI is uniquely placed as a producer and provider of data, information and knowledge focused on livestock R&D in developing countries. It has a vast collection of information on livestock agriculture and access to information produced by its NARS partners. Traditionally, NARS researchers have been on the receiving side of the information exchange. Technological developments and their rapid adoption will make it possible for NARS, extension staff and increasingly for farmers to actively participate in global information exchange.
Communication technologies will allow ILRI's information services to have global relevance and impact through electronically mediated collaboration, thus enhancing interactions between scientists at distant sites. ILRI will expand its existing links with other important information brokers, such as FAO and CAB International. Collaboration with FAO in particular will lead to a shared strategy for information systems for strengthened livestock R&D and for food security.
Capacity. Improved institutional capacity for livestock R&D will be achieved through training and facilitating links and networks. Training activities to which ILRI will contribute include degree-related research programmes; short courses and individually tailored programmes undertaken on behalf of, or in conjunction with, partners, including international organisations and universities; and the development of training resources. Advances in technology will allow ILRI to develop Web-based training resources that NARS and developing country universities can cost effectively use.
The Third CGIAR System Review recommended the development of a demand-led African Capacity Building Initiative in sub-Saharan Africa. ILRI will contribute to the livestock and crop–livestock components of the initiative. It will retain a separate training function to build capacity for livestock R&D outside sub-Saharan Africa.
Networking will make it possible for NARS partners to jointly plan and set priorities, implement agreed collaborative research agendas, train and share information. By 2010 the subregional organisations in sub-Saharan Africa will have taken increasing responsibility for supporting and managing the livestock agriculture networks. While the role of ILRI as coordinator may cease, there will still be a strong need to maintain effective partnerships and to collaborate. Thus a framework that will respond to the continuing needs of NARS–ILRI partnerships in sub-Saharan Africa is essential. The joint development of new networking paradigms, based on shared information and knowledge, supporting research to extension and technology exchange, will become important activities during the 10-year period.
ILRI's global consultations with its partners in the regions of Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Central Asia, West Asia and North Africa on the agenda for livestock research have underscored the continuing need for capacity building in the NARS. The campuses in Ethiopia and Kenya will remain the base for much of ILRI's training, but specific activities will be based and implemented at the most appropriate locations. Outside sub-Saharan Africa, ILRI will support existing livestock or livestock-related networks and build capacity within NARS–ILRI research projects.
Information and knowledge products will be purveyed increasingly through Net-based technologies, in place of print media. Training to strengthen capacity will address both groups and individuals. Individual training will include increased reliance on visiting scientist, visiting scholar and post-doctoral arrangements involving the priority regions, systems and key research areas. Involvement in formal and informal networks as collaborating partners will help ensure relevance and responsiveness to NARS priorities.
Transfer of information products is a principal mechanism for establishing and maintaining links among the research areas within ILRI and between ILRI and its partners.
Training is integrally linked with ILRI's research activities, driven by partner needs and ILRI–NARS collaborative research. Networking by definition is creating, maintaining and using links in an external environment, in this case among ILRI and partners. Training contributes to the capacity and the knowledge required for these links to operate successfully.
Information. Provision of information and knowledge both internally and externally to ILRI's partners—especially NARS—will enhance their capacity to undertake effective research. Products of NARS' own research and wider appreciation of the results of ILRI's research will result in resource-poor livestock keepers having access to better technology options. This will help to reduce poverty, increase food security and ameliorate harmful environmental effects.
Capacity. Training that responds to priority needs of NARS is assured of high impact because it is relevant and trainees can put their newly acquired knowledge into immediate use. Collaboration among partners means 1) joint and better planning and priority setting, 2) joint and more effective implementation of agreed activities and 3) pooling of resources in scientific mass and capital. Training and networking activities will build capacity for livestock R&D that will lead to increased productivity and ultimately contribute to reducing poverty, improving food security and protecting the environment.
The production-to-consumption systems approach will permeate all the key research and related areas of endeavour at ILRI as an essential and holistic integrating device, rather than a stand-alone key research area. Determining the problems and constraints that will define the research and related agenda will come from collaboration with NARS in joint, participatory activities. This will be a two-way process, with the research products being made available for adaptation and adoption into smallholder animal agriculture. This approach responds to concerns about the lack of impact from past livestock R&D efforts. Introducing this integrating paradigm has important implications internationally for the roles, responsibilities and location of ILRI staff.
The seven key areas will be integrated at two levels: at the planning stage based on participatory needs assessments, and at the validation stage in the field. This integration is important to achieve focus, relevance and impact and to exploit scientific synergies.
The production-to-consumption systems research paradigm in an ecoregion will involve staff in the field. ILRI scientists will provide the livestock component in a broader ecoregional consortium of scientists from other centres and from national and regional institutes. For research based outside ILRI's two principal sites in eastern Africa, ILRI will depend on partners for both the scientific capacity and the physical infrastructure for the livestock research components that are not strategic and for the non-livestock research components. This strategy will help ensure flexibility to respond to new opportunities, emerging issues and fluctuating financing, as well as minimise ILRI's institutional overheads and depreciation costs.
These field-based projects to come will focus on the market-oriented crop–livestock systems that have primary priority as identified in Chapter 1. They will provide the necessary primary information to help set ILRI priorities and assess impact, and they will conduct collaborative research in the field to integrate results obtained in the different key research areas. The precise role that ILRI will play in research will vary, according to its comparative or complementary advantages in the various regions and the existence of alternative suppliers. One of ILRI's primary roles will be to conduct transregional analyses, to derive lessons of broad relevance, as for example, in market-oriented smallholder dairy systems.
To build synergies across its centres, the CGIAR has organised a number of inter-centre initiatives that address issues of critical importance.
One of these is the Systemwide Livestock Programme (SLP), which ILRI convenes (see Box 3.1). It is the largest single CGIAR systemwide programme. As ILRI moves into a more catalytic mode, SLP is working with the CGIAR crop centres to meet the growing demand for pork and poultry meat, largely from industrialised systems and primarily based on feed grains. Specifically, attention is focusing on research to improve feed production and natural resource management on the farm.
Box 3.1Systemwide Livestock ProgrammeThe Systemwide Livestock Programme (SLP) seeks to—
Under this concept, some research falls solely within ILRI and some is livestock related, with common themes across centres. SLP research focuses on
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ILRI's own research will be closely allied with research of ecoregional consortia, in which the significant input from crop centres and national partners ensures that natural resource management and other environmental research follow a true systems perspective rather than dealing with only a single component of an agricultural system.
Through SLP, the institute supports ongoing research in regional and ecoregional initiatives that include the African Highlands Ecoregional Programme, the Global Mountain Initiative, the Ecoregional Programme for the Humid and Subhumid Tropics of Sub-Saharan Africa (EPHTA), the Consortium for the Sustainable Development of the Andean Ecoregion (CONDESAN) and the Consorcio de Investigación sobre Sistemas de Producción Animal de Doble Propósito (TROPILECHE)—all of the CGIAR—and consortia of centres and national partners in southern Africa, South-East Asia, and the West Asia–North Africa region. Other initiatives to which ILRI contributes are the Desert Margins Programme, the Inland Valleys Initiative, the Genetic Resources Initiative and the Initiative on Property Rights and Collective Action. Through consortia involving IFPRI and others, ILRI will contribute on topics such as livestock trade and policy, either directly or through SLP.
The Technical Advisory Committee of the CGIAR commissioned a recent evaluation of some of these initiatives. The review concluded that they were effective in managing interinstitutional collaboration. It is expected that the initiatives will continue over the mid to long term. And ILRI will continue to be involved in their activities.