What Would Happen To The Economy If We Did Not Raise Animals For Meat

Livestock - a driving strength for food security and sustainable development

R. Sansoucy

The writer is Senior Officer, FAO Feed Resource Group.
The article has been prepared with the collaboration of the staff of the FAO Brute Production and Health Division.

Population trends
Resources management
The direct role of livestock for food security
Livestock equally a supplier of production inputs for sustainable agricultural evolution
Non-food attributes of livestock as a factor of sustainable agronomics
Conclusions
Bibliography

"Development will bring food security only if it is people-centred, if it is environmentally sound, if it is participatory, and if information technology builds local and national chapters for self-reliance. These are the bones characteristics of sustainable human development."
- James Gustave Speltz (UNDP, 1994)

Although nutrient availability has increased along with the growing human population over the last xxx years, there are still 800 1000000 people suffering from malnutrition. This problem is not merely the outcome of insufficient food production and inadequate distribution, merely also of the financial disability of the poor to purchase food of reasonable quality in acceptable quantities to satisfy their needs (FAO, 1993a).

Livestock product constitutes a very of import component of the agricultural economic system of developing countries, a contribution that goes beyond straight nutrient product to include multipurpose uses, such as skins, fibre, fertilizer and fuel, also equally capital accumulation. Furthermore, livestock are closely linked to the social and cultural lives of several million resource-poor farmers for whom animate being ownership ensures varying degrees of sustainable farming and economical stability.

The importance of livestock in the agronomical sector has been emphasized in a number of FAO publications, notably, Livestock product: a world perspective (FAO, 1982), The function of ruminant livestock in food security in developing countries (FAO, 1992), Livestock and comeback of pasture, feed and forage (FAO, 1993a) and Strategies for sustainable brute agriculture in developing countries (FAO, 1993b).

This commodity does not endeavour to be comprehensive, simply rather aims at emphasizing the importance of both directly and indirect contributions of livestock to food security and sustainable evolution at a global level.

1. Population statistics 1960 and 1990 - Statistiques démographiques 1960 et 1990 - Estadísticas de población, 1960 y 1990

	Humans		Large ruminants		Pocket-size ruminants		Pigs		Poultry
	1960	1990	1960	1990	1960	1990	1960	1990	1960	1990
(millions)
Earth	3074	5389	1035	1434	1365	1808	406	856	3922	10770
Adult countries	977	1251	343	404	573	591	235	341	2274	4465
Developing countries	2097	4138	692	1029	792	1217	171	515	1648	6305
Increment in developing countries (%)		+97		+48		+53		+200		+280

Source: FAO AGROSTAT, 1992.

Population trends

Human being and livestock populations accept both grown considerably over the last 3 decades, although at dissimilar rates (Table i). The major differences are institute between developed and developing countries. Since 1960 the total human population has increased past 75 percent, but developing-country populations have grown by 97 percent, compared with 28 percent in the industrialized world. All categories of livestock have increased in number as well, with a much greater increase for monogastric animals (pigs and poultry) than for ruminants. Ruminant populations take grown at about one-half the charge per unit of the human population, while small ruminant populations (sheep and goats) take only increased in developing countries. The pig and poultry populations, however, accept grown about one-and-a-one-half to two times that of the human population, and are iii to four times greater in developing countries than they are in adult countries.

The world population is expected to increase from 5.4 billion to at to the lowest degree vii.2 billion within the next two decades, mainly in developing countries. This increase in human population, with the resulting increase in pressure on land and changes in composition of the livestock population, will have a major effect on both bachelor natural resource and time to come demand for bolt, and this will consequently decide the blazon of livestock feeding and production systems to be adopted.

Official statistics tend to underestimate the overall contribution of animals since they generally underestimate or ignore the multipurpose role livestock play in food and agricultural production, likewise as in the social life of small-scale farmers in developing countries.

Resources management

To feed the growing human being population, more than land volition demand to be devoted to the tillage of food and cash crops and, being a finite resource, this volition reduce its availability for pasture and fodder, every bit has already occurred in Asia (Tabular array 2). On the other hand, increased nutrient and cash crops volition make bachelor more crop residues and agro-industrial by-products, many of which represent valuable animal feed resources for which in that location is known applied science to support increased levels of production. It is clear that, in order to maintain food production, the efficiency of resources utilization must be increased and alternatives - such as marine and freshwater fish culture - must be developed.

two. Population, land availability and output in developing countries - Population, superficies agricoles disponibles et product dans les pays en développement - Población, disponibilidad de tierra y producción en los países en desarrollo

	Sub-Saharan Africa	Asia	Latin America	West Asia and North Africa	All
(millions)
Population	501	2740	448	316	4005
(ha per caput)
Cultivated state	0.35	0.xviii	0.43	0.29	0.24
Grazing land	1.26	0.17	one.27	0.84	0.49
(US$ per caput)
Value of crops	83.vii	89.2	144.8	64.eight	92.9
Value of livestock	19.5	25.seven	78.1	39.9	31.9

Source: FAO AGROSTAT, 1993.

3. Trends and projections in food production in developing countries - Tendances et projections de la production alimentaire des pays en développement - Tendencias y proyecciones de la producción de alimentos en los países en desarrollo

Product	Production (million tonnes)			Growth rate (%)
Product	1969/71	1988/90	2010	1970-1990	1990-2010
Wheat	67	132	205	iii.viii	2.1
Rice	177	303	459	3.0	2.0
Milk	78.0	147.3	247.six	three.5	2.5
Meat	28.5	64.8	143.0	four.6	3.viii
Eggs	4.6	15.iii
Fish	16.iv	35.1	-	-	-

Source: FAO, 1993c.

The importance of animals as an efficient and economic means of food production has been challenged, as have its effects on the environment. These concerns take been expressed on a number of issues, notably:

· Competition with alternative land uses and with the use of cereals (and some roots and tubers) as fauna feed or for human consumption.
· Competition for carbohydrate and poly peptide sources.

· Inability to meet national targets for animal proteins.

· Just a few large investments in livestock evolution projects have been marginally successful in increasing productivity and these accept had a limited affect on agronomics.

· Inadequate sit-in of how livestock tin can play a key function in the development of sustainable agriculture in different agro-ecosystems, and the failure to transfer advisable technologies. In detail, near of the increase in beast products has come from an increase in animal numbers rather than from an increase in individual-beast productivity.

· Resource deposition and environmental damage caused past deforestation, overgrazing and pollution.

· Contribution to global warming (methyl hydride from ruminants represents 2.v percent of full greenhouse gases).

· Pollution from concentrations of intensive creature product enterprises.

Many of these problems are a consequence of the inability to identify appropriate technologies and define strategies for livestock evolution that are applicable to individual agro-ecosystems. Often, technology is transferred from developed countries unmodified, rather than generating appropriate technologies within the developing countries themselves. Imported technologies have near ever failed to overcome the constraints imposed on local farming systems or to see the socio-economic requirements of the local farmers.

Careful assay and assessment are required so that livestock evolution strategies can be reoriented towards better use of local resources, contribute more than finer to nutrient security, improve the living standards of poor farmers and ensure sustainable brute agriculture development. The determining factors of this overall strategy include:

· political back up for fair article prices and proposed strategies;
· better definition of the target recipients' needs;

· increased efficiency of utilize and management of natural resources;

· linking of product and post-production components to efficient infrastructure, services and marketing schemes;

· more than appropriate policies for the use of common state and rangelands;

· improved chapters and delivery of national and international agricultural centres and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to implement strategies that contribute to the development of livestock production within specific agro-ecosystems/ecoregions.

In livestock product, the overriding considerations are the availability and efficient utilise of local natural resources. A successful livestock development strategy requires the formulation of resource management plans that complement the wider economical, ecological and sociological objectives. Particular attention needs to exist given to land-use systems and to the natural resources required for improved livestock product. The strategy will also need to consider the social, cultural, political and institutional elements that affect the management of natural resources. On the policy side, issues relating to country use, mutual holding, legislation, cost policies, subsidies, levies, national priorities for livestock development and enquiry capacity have to be addressed. Finally, the implementation of action programmes requires both technical and institutional back up and, equally important, government commitment.

The direct role of livestock for nutrient security

Livestock as an important food source

Trends in livestock food supply in developing countries . Livestock are of import contributors to full food production. Moreover, their contribution increases at a higher charge per unit than that of cereals (Table 3). Recent increases in livestock products appear to be even more than spectacular than those achieved for cereals from the light-green revolution. Most notably, egg product has increased past 331 percent over the last ii decades, compared with 127 per centum for meat production, 78 percentage for cereals and 113 per centum for fish (equivalent to 58 percent of that of meat production).

4. Per head consumption of meat, milk and fish in 1990 - Consommation de viande, de lait et de poisson par habitant en 1990 - Consumo por habitante de carne, leche y pescado en 1990

Region	Meat	Milk	Fish
Region	(kg/year)
World	32.9	75.0	xiii.1
Developed	81.six	200.0	26.8
Developing	17.7	36.6	viii.8
Africa	11.4	27.5	viii.0
Latin America	41.1	93.nine	8.half-dozen
Virtually Eastward	19.6	lx.7	4.4
Far East	fifteen.1	27.0	9.four

Source: FAO AGROSTAT, 1992.

By the year 2010, animal products are expected to contribute proportionally much more than to the nutrient supply than they practice at nowadays, since income determines the protein intake of people, particularly in urban areas. Of the different animal species, meat production from monogastric animals (poultry and pigs) has increased at a much higher charge per unit than that from either small ruminants (sheep and goats) or large ruminants (cattle and buffaloes). While in 1970 ruminant and monogastric meat production rates were approximately equal, it is expected that by 2010 monogastrics may produce ii.4 times more meat than ruminants, providing that feed is bachelor and affordable (Figure i; Box 1).

Per caput consumption of animal products

Given the low per caput intake of animal products in developing countries compared with that in developed countries (Table four), there is considerable potential for increasing consumption and, hence, production of animal products (milk and meat) in these countries. An enormous number of poor people in developing countries cannot afford to include animal products in their diets - they are vegetarians by necessity rather than past pick.

Per caput nutrient supply in developing countries

Calories . Animate being products are primarily a source of proteins and essential amino acids, only when they are a major elective of the human diet they as well contribute a significant proportion of total calories. In adult countries they provide more than than xxx percent of calories in the diet (Figure 2). In developing countries, however, this proportion is less than 10 percent, but they are a source of essential amino acids that balance the largely vegetable-based proteins.

Proteins . In adult countries, near 60 percent of the dietary protein supply is derived from beast products, which is college than necessary for essential amino acids (Figure 2). This effigy is only 22 pct in developing countries, which is less than desirable and takes no account of the skewed distribution in favour of the middle classes - the poor really have a much lower poly peptide intake. In these countries, where diets are composed of only a small number of staple foods, brute products are of groovy importance in preventing malnutrition as they are concentrated sources of the limited essential amino acids available in vegetable proteins of staple foods.

Fats . Excessive consumption of calories, particularly fatty from animal products, is often the cause of human health problems, especially in wealthy societies. Figure 2 clearly demonstrates that excessive consumption of fauna fat is not a problem for people in developing countries. In fact, animal fats complement an often-deficient calorie intake.

Livestock assist to alleviate seasonal food variability . Even though milk product is seasonal and surpluses cannot exist stored equally easily every bit cereal grains, there are simple technologies that allow herders to go on milk products for weeks or months in the form of clarified butter, curds or various types of cheese. Animals, specially small livestock, are slaughtered as the need arises. Meat preserved past drying, salting, curing and smoking can be used when other food sources are deficient.

i. Trends in meat production in developing countries - Evolution de la production de viande dans les pays en développement - Tendencias de la producción de carne en los países en desarrollo

ii. Per caput nutrient supply - Apport d'éléments nutritifs par habitant - Suministro de nutrientes por habitante

Livestock equally a source of income

Fauna products not simply represent a source of high-quality food, just, as of import, they are a source of income for many pocket-sized farmers in developing countries, for purchasing food as well as agricultural inputs, such as seed, fertilizers and pesticides.

At the national level, livestock food products represent 27 percentage of the full farm production. This subsector has achieved the greatest growth in production over the final three decades, and information technology is expected that information technology will continue to grow faster than all other agricultural subsectors in the side by side twenty years (Table five). The total value of milk and meat represents 3.5 times the value of wheat and rice and two.8 times the value of fish (Tabular array 6). In addition, in that location are various other products and services provided by livestock that are not accounted for in these statistics, merely which would increase the total value of livestock considerably.

At farm level, greenbacks tin exist generated regularly from direct sales of livestock products, such as milk, eggs and manure, occasionally from the sale of alive animals, wool, meat and hides and from fees for draught power or transport services.

An important feature of dairy income is its regularity. India'south dairy development plan Functioning Flood has created cooperatives that pay daily for the milk delivered, thereby providing regular income to thousands of poor farmers. An FAO/United Nations Development Program (UNDP) dairy projection in Burkina Faso assisted 100 families in increasing their monthly income by virtually Usa$eighty, which is equivalent to an actress labour unit per family unit. In many countries, the provision of beast draught power services for cultivation, transportation and the pumping of irrigation water is an important source of income that is specially beneficial to landless owners of cattle or buffalo.

Livestock also provide increased economic stability to the farm or household, interim every bit a greenbacks buffer (pocket-sized livestock) and as upper-case letter reserve (large animals), likewise as a deterrent against inflation. In mixed-farming systems, livestock reduce the risks associated with crop production. They also stand for liquid avails that can exist realized at any time, calculation further stability to the production organization.

The importance of livestock equally a source of income for poor farmers is illustrated by the instance of the Grameen Bank in People's republic of bangladesh, which assists only the poorest segment of the population and provides virtually 50 percent of its loans for the purchase of livestock, mainly large ruminants for milk production and draught ability.

Livestock every bit a generator of employment

At farm level, dairying is a labour-intensive activeness, involving women in both production and marketing. Labour typically accounts for over 40 percent of full costs in smallholder systems. It has been estimated that for each 6 to x kg of additional milk processed per day in Republic of india, one working day is added for feeding and intendance. Data from Kenya prove that smallholder production there is in the gild of 25 kg per working 24-hour interval; similar levels were experienced on parastatal dairy farms in Republic of zimbabwe.

Caprine animal, sheep, poultry and rabbit husbandry, especially in lawn production systems, provides an important source of part-fourth dimension chore opportunities, particularly for landless women and children.

The livestock-production processing sector has also been identified as a correspondent to employment generation and the reduction of rural depopulation. Pocket-size-calibration milk processing/marketing is labour-intensive (fifty to 100 kg per working twenty-four hour period) and generates employment and income from the local industry of at to the lowest degree part of the equipment required. The meat sector also provides significant employment opportunities. Based on UN published data and experience from FAO projects, estimates accept been made of labour requirements in small to medium-sized slaughter and meat processing operations (Table 7).

BOX 1

Practice livestock of the rich swallow the grain of the poor?

Nigh fifty pct of the grains produced in the earth are fed to livestock, yet at that place remain virtually 800 1000000 people suffering from hunger and malnutrition mostly in the developing countries. Because surplus grains are produced in adult countries, it has been causeless that increasing livestock production volition be based on grains at the expense of poor people. Is this true?

· About 85 pct of total grains fed to livestock throughout the earth are fed to livestock in industrialized countries, simply at an enormous environmental cost in terms of fossil fuel. Grain importation into developing countries has steadily increased, however, specially to feed animals that are consumed by the minority higher-income sectors of society. The problem is twofold: kickoff, the poor cannot afford to buy these cereals considering of their low income, and, 2nd, the importation of grains distorts the market for locally produced feed resource.

· Considering grains are widely available in developed, temperate countries, or because they have the wealth to import them, these countries can beget to use the grains to feed animals, specially as production costs do not include the imputed costs of soil erosion, loss of fertility and environmental degradation. Developing countries, which have neither the available grain resources nor the money to import them, should, however, follow the same philosophy for feeding their animals, that is, they should use their own locally bachelor feed resources, not grains!

· Grains are not indispensable for feeding livestock. Historically, grains have been regarded as the near convenient, if not the simply, manner to feed monogastrics and even fatten ruminants. Subsidies to produce grains have assisted their use at the expense of feeding systems based on local resources. FAO has given high priority over the last 20 years to developing culling feeding systems, for monogastrics as well as for ruminant animals, which make trivial or no use of grains. In five years, a project in China has fabricated cropping zones become the most important producers of beefiness, using only urea-treated straw and cottonseed cake as supplements, with no use whatsoever of grains. Sugarcane juice, palm oil, sugar palm juice and cassava tubers take successfully been tested to replace grains in hog feeding in about xv countries in the tropical Americas and Asia. Other local free energy sources are being actively sought as alternatives to grains.

Livestock as a supplier of product inputs for sustainable agricultural development

In mixed-farming systems, not only can farmers mitigate risks past producing a multitude of commodities, merely they can too increase the productivity of both crops and animals in a more profitable and sustainable manner. In this context, livestock can brand a major contribution to the efficient use of available natural resources.

Livestock as a source of energy

Draught animal power . Bovines, equines, camelids and elephants are all used as sources of draught power for a variety of purposes, such as pulling agronomical implements, pumping irrigation water and skidding in forests. The current number of animals used for draught purposes is estimated at 400 million. Fifty-two percentage of the cultivated area in developing countries (excluding China) is farmed using just draught animals and 26 percent using only hand tools (Gifford 1992). During the by ten years, at that place has been a 23-percent increase in the number of cattle and buffaloes used for draught purposes as well as for meat and milk product. During the same menstruum, the number of equines (horses, mules and asses) used primarily for draught and transport has not inverse significantly.

Compared with the use of tractors, animal power is a renewable energy source in many developing countries and is produced on the farm, with nigh all the implements required made locally. On the other paw, ninety percent of the globe'southward tractors and their implements are produced in industrialized countries and about of those used in developing countries (approximately 19 percent) have to be imported. Animal traction, therefore, avoids the drain of foreign exchange involved in the importation of tractors, spare parts and fuel.

Draught animals remain the most toll-effective ability source for pocket-size and medium-scale farmers. Draught animal power can be fifty-fifty more than economic when one bullock is used instead of a pair or when a (cross-bred) cow is used instead of a male, since it reduces the cost of maintaining the larger herd necessary to satisfy both replacement and milk product requirements.

It is expected that draught animal power volition refuse slightly by the year 2000 (FAO, 1987) as will dependency on human power (Figure 3), but the contribution of draught animals will remain much more than of import than that of mechanical traction. Given their importance equally major contributors to food crop production, equally a take chances-avoidance mechanism and as a source of income, greater efforts need to exist devoted to promoting the wider and more efficient utilise of draught animals.

v. Major commodity groups in total gross agricultural production in 93 developing countries - Principaux groupes de produits de base dans la production agricole brute de 93 pays en développement - Principales grupos de productos básicos en la producción agropecuaria bruta full de 93 países en desarrollo

Commodity group	Share of total value (%)	Almanac growth rates of production (%)
		1961-1970	1970-1980	1980-1990	1990-2010
Cereals	30	4.1	iii.0	2.8	two.0
Roots, tubers, plantains and pulses	9	ii.5	1.v	1.half-dozen	i.7
Other food crops	27	3.one	3.5	3.seven	two.viii
Non-nutrient crops	seven	two.7	1.three	3.one	ii.two
Livestock	27	3.nine	3.8	4.6	3.4
Total	100	iii.5	3.0	3.4	2.6

Source: FAO, 1993c, p. 65.

6. Estimated value of food commodities (1990-1992 boilerplate) - Valeur estimée des produits alimentaires (moyenne 1990-1992) - Valor estimado de los productos alimenticios (premedio de 1990-1992)

Article		Earth	Developed countries	Developing countries
Article		(one thousand thousand US$)
Wheat		77325	49893	27432
Rice		102547	7606	94941
Fish*		223381	111531	111850
Total meat and milk		619106	404160	214946
MiIk		218153	158119	60034
Meat		400953	246041	154912
	- bovine meat	120726	86353	34373
	- ovine meat	17010	7250	9760
	- hog meat	193603	108062	85541
	- poultry meat	69614	44376	25238

* Average 1889-1991.
Source: FAO, 1993c.

7. Staff requirements for meat processing/marketing operations - Main-d'œuvre nécessaire pour les opérations de transformation et de commercialisation de la viande - Necesidades de mano de obra para el procesamiento y el mercadeo de la carne

	Staff requirements for 30 animals (persons/twenty-four hour period)
	Slaughtering	Meat marketing	Further processing
Cattle	20	iv	>80
Pigs	10	2	>xxx
Small ruminants	3	1	-

Dung for fuel . In many countries, cow dung is highly valued as fuel for cooking and heating, reducing expenditures for fuelwood or fossil fuels. It represents the major fuel supply for household utilise by millions of farmers in Asia, Africa and in parts of the Virtually East and Latin America. In India alone, 300 1000000 tonnes of dung are used for fuel every yr. The collection and drying of dung for cooking generates income for women. It is also used direct as plaster and other building materials, while its ash can exist used as fertilizer.

Biogas production . Biogas product from manure is an splendid substitute for fossil fuel or fuelwood for farmers in tropical countries. The all-time manure for these purposes comes from (in descending order) pigs, cattle, horses, camels and poultry (Kumar and Biswas, 1982). Twenty-five kilograms of fresh cow dung produces almost 1 m³ of biogas. Simple low-cost plastic biodigesters have recently been developed in Cambodia, the United Republic of Tanzania and Viet Nam through a number of FAO/Technical Cooperation Programme (TCP) projects. On-subcontract biogas production reduces the workload of women by eliminating wood drove or fuel purchasing. Information technology is person-friendly because of its convenience and increased hygiene, and it likewise provides a number of services, such every bit lighting, warm h2o and heating. Biogas can also exist used to bulldoze mechanism such as h2o pumps. Effluent from biodigesters can be recycled as fertilizer - with even meliorate results than the original manure (Talukder, Ali and Latif, 1988) - or as a fish feed, or it may be used to grow azolla and duckweed. Biogas technology has been successfully adopted by millions of farmers in developing countries; most 25 1000000 people use information technology in China alone (Marchaim, 1992). New simple technology should be promoted to extend biogas evolution. Biodigestion has positive public-health aspects, particularly where toilets are coupled with the biodigester, and the anaerobic conditions impale pathogenic organisms as well equally digest toxins, for example, botulinum toxin. In China, biogas (CO₂+CH₄) from dung has also been used to control insects in stored grains using the anaerobic reaction, without adverse effects on grain germination (Zhin and Pan, 1983).

Livestock every bit a source of fertilizer and soil conditioner

Nutrient recycling is an essential component of any sustainable farming system. The integration of livestock and crops allows for efficient nutrient recycling. Animals use the crop residues, such as cereal straws, equally well equally maize and sorghum stovers and groundnut haulms as feed. The manure produced can be recycled direct as fertilizer. One tonne of cow dung contains about eight kg N. 4 kg P_iiO_v and 16 kg K₂O (Angé, 1994). The chemical composition of manure varies, however, co-ordinate to the animate being species (poultry manure appears to be a more efficient fertilizer than cow manure) and as well to the nature of their diet. For example, farmers in Kingdom of cambodia and the Niger accept observed that they obtain more than rice grain when they use manure from animals fed on urea-treated harbinger (considering of its higher nitrogen content) than when they use that derived from animals fed on untreated straw. It has been estimated that, in the semiarid tropics, less than vi percent of the cropped area receives an average application of ten tonnes of manure per hectare every year. In the humid tropics, upwards to 12 percent of the cropped area may be manured at this level. In addition to the directly contribution of plant nutrients, manure provides important organic matter to the soil, maintaining its structure, water memory and drainage capacity. The value of manure is so well-recognized that some farmers go along livestock primarily for this purpose.

The cultivation of legume fodders and trees, for case, in alley farming systems, also contributes to the enrichment of soils through nitrogen fixation. Soybeans in the boiling tropics can supply 40 kg of nitrogen per hectare, although this contribution varies considerably with the species.

In systems using sugar cane as livestock feed, for example, in Colombia and Viet Nam, it has been demonstrated that the recycling of dead leaves into the soil (instead of called-for them) favours the fixation of nitrogen by bacteria and reduces weed growth and water evaporation, thus increasing the yield of the subsequent harvest.

Livestock and weed control

Livestock, particularly sheep, are efficient in decision-making weeds. They are used in many countries in the Mediterranean basin to reduce wood undergrowth and so that the risk of burn during summer is macerated. In safety and oil-palm plantations in Malaysia, the integration of livestock to employ the vegetative basis cover under the tree canopy has been shown to increase overall production and save upwardly to twoscore percent of the cost of weed command (Chen et al., 1988). Similarly, sheep take recently been used to control weeds in carbohydrate-cane fields in Colombia (Carte Asolucerna, 1994), suppressing the price of herbicides, reducing by one-half the full cost of weed control and providing an additional income from meat production. Such systems likewise safeguard the surround and avoid chemical pollution while supplying additional organic material to the soil.

3. Sources of power in agriculture - Sources d'énergie employées dans l'agriculture - Fuentes de energía en la agriculture

Women play an of import function in livestock development, peculiarly in collecting and carrying feeds... - Les femmes jouent un g rôle dans le développement de l'élevage, notamment en récoltant et en transportant les aliments destinés aux animaux... - Las mujeres desempeñan una función importante en el fomento de la ganadería, sobre todo mediante la recolección y el transporte de piensos...

... and in milking and taking care of animals (Viet Nam) - ... et en trayant et en soignant les animaux (Viet Nam) - ... y el ordeño y el cuidado de los animales (Viet Nam)

Livestock-recycled secondary products, household and industrial wastes

Not only can manure be recycled for biogas and fertilizer, simply it can besides exist a valuable source of feed for other animal species. For example, poultry manure is usually used for ruminant feeding and poultry and pig manures tin be used to generate algae equally a feed for fish.

Past-products such as abattoir wastes, when adequately processed, brand a good source of poly peptide (offal and viscera) and mineral (bones) supplements in animal feeds.

In developing countries, household wastes are commonly fed to pigs and minor animals in backyard farming systems. In urban and pert-urban areas, eating place and catering wastes can be readily processed for pigs, as is washed in Republic of cuba.

Industrial fish waste creates pollution around canning plants. The common practice is to dry it, at a very high cost, in order to produce fish-repast, which is then usually exported to developed countries. Preservation of fish waste product in molasses has proved to exist an pick that is technically and economically viable for poor farmers. Such recycling makes animal agriculture systems more sustainable and environmentally audio (Box ii).

Utilization of marginal lands and crop residues past livestock

In the vast semi-arid or arid areas where crop production is extremely risky, livestock can use vegetation that would otherwise exist wasted and convert information technology to valuable, high-quality products. However, these are environmentally frail areas. Over the centuries, pastoralists established circuitous management systems that were sustainable until the relatively recent dramatic increases in population and subsequent livestock density. Overgrazing is the master threat to these areas, and a holistic approach to resource management is necessary to avoid their permanent and irreversible degradation.

Crop residues, such as straw, are more efficiently utilized through ruminant feeding, including the product and use of manure and perhaps biogas, rather than past burning them, creating pollution and contributing to global warming, or ploughing them dorsum into the soil to improve its structure and h2o retentivity. Several hundred million head of cattle and buffaloes are fed throughout the year on rice and cereal straws.

Non-food attributes of livestock as a factor of sustainable agriculture

Increasing animal product saves foreign substitution

At present, developing countries are major importers of animal feeds (mainly coarse grains) as well every bit meat and dairy products. The toll of importing animal feeds into developing countries is estimated at between US$10 billion and $15 billion per year (Figure 4). Although exports of animal feeds are not negligible, a large proportion of them are oilseed cakes. Being an important source of featherbed protein, the cakes could exist put to amend use locally to improve production from the national herd, which, in plow, would reduce imports of animal products.

The trade of meat products is better counterbalanced, as imports and exports have followed similar annual trends, as illustrated by the parallel curves plotted in Figure 5. Globally, nevertheless, these data mask the fact that exports are made by relatively few, high-producing countries only. In that location is still substantial potential for increasing local production to save foreign exchange from import substitution and to increase rural incomes.

The situation regarding the importation of dairy products into developing countries is critical. Imports take dramatically increased during the terminal three decades, while exports accept remained negligible (Figure 6). The prospects for local dairy production have recently become more than favourable, even so, following the reduction of milk production subsidies in western developed countries and the introduction of more realistic exchange rates under structural adjustment programmes. These recent changes have provided many developing countries with the opportunity to develop their own milk industries, primarily through pocket-size production, which will have a major impact on different levels of cash income.

BOX two

Do livestock contribute to environmental deposition?

Livestock are frequently accused of contributing to soil erosion in different ways. One classic example is the deforestation in the Amazon to produce grazing state, which has attracted much attention from ecologists and the mass media. Yet clearly it is not the animals that cut down the copse! The responsibleness lies with the business concern people who - aided and abetted by government subsidies - cause irreversible damage past destroying the forests to plant pastures for short-term financial gain. Some other example is that of the long-term overgrazing of semi-barren rangelands, which has lead increasingly to desertification. It is well known, however, that sound resource management could avoid this deterioration of the environment while maintaining a productive system.

If livestock are managed in an appropriate manner, they tin even contribute to the reduction of soil erosion. The utilise of perennial forage trees and high biomass fodders (sugar cane) and the institution of fodder hedgerows on the profile provide excellent protection against erosion and should be established practices.

Agro-sylvo-pastoral systems in semi-arid areas are a viable proposition for the protection of the fragile soils of these regions. Multipurpose trees contribute to the protection of the soil, too equally to animal and energy production, and store carbon that would otherwise contribute to atmospheric carbon dioxide.

It is also a criticism of ruminant production that the animals contribute to the greenhouse result, since they produce methane as an end-production of rumen digestion. Information technology should exist recognized, still, that ruminant populations have increased but moderately compared with those of other species, and that their contribution is estimated at but ii.5 pct of the total greenhouse gases (Leng, 1993). Gas emissions from cars and industry are far greater and take increased at a much higher rate. There are ii ways to reduce methyl hydride emission from livestock: past introducing an advisable diet supplementation that could reduce ruminant methane production per unit of milk or meat by a gene of 4 to 6, and by favouring the product of meat from monogastric animals.

The third complaint nearly livestock is pollution resulting from accumulated excrete and nitrite-contaminated groundwater. This is primarily a problem with intensive, industrialized production systems. It tin be reduced by implementing manure processing technologies likewise as nutrition and feeding strategies that reduce the corporeality of nitrogen and phosphorus in the diet of animals. It could also be controlled by limiting the size of such enterprises to that which allows excrete to be easily accommodated on neighbouring lands or used for fertilizer products. Smallholders unremarkably crusade less pollution than big intensive units.

Livestock for investment and savings

In the rural areas of many developing countries financial services such as credit, banking and insurance are almost not-existent. In these areas, livestock play an important role every bit a means of saving and majuscule investment, and they often provide a substantially higher return than alternative investments. A combination of small and large livestock that can be sold to see petty-cash requirements to embrace seasonal consumption deficits or to finance larger expenditures represents a valuable asset for the farmer.

Other products and functions

Hides and skins . The yield of hides and skins in relation to the overall weight of the slaughtered animal is approximately 6.5 percent for cattle and 10 percent for small ruminants. Sus scrofa skins are not considered a by-product since they are ordinarily used as food.

World product of hides and skins increased significantly betwixt the 1960s and the 1980s, with bovine hides reaching i.8 million tonnes (55-pct increase) and sheep and goat skins up to 220 000 tonnes (v-pct increase). Over the same flow, even so, product in developing countries vicious; bovine hides dropped past fifty per centum (down to 47 000 tonnes) and sheep and caprine animal skins were reduced past 25 per centum (downward to 68 000 tonnes). Since the number of cattle and small ruminants slaughtered has not declined in developing countries, it must be concluded that hides and skins are not being fully utilized. FAO has already initiated efforts to better flaying techniques to increment hide and skin quality. The world market cost for cattle has varied between Us$1.50 and $2 per kilogram over the last ten years, which ought to give acceptable incentive for the product of better quality raw hides and skins.

Other functions . Often livestock keeping has considerable social and cultural- significance, which may be the main reason for keeping animals in many societies. Information technology is non ever possible to attach monetary value to many of these roles. Nevertheless, they cannot be ignored, since animals for cultural or religious events may command very high prices.

4. Value of feed grain imports and exports in developing countries, 1961 to 1989 - Valeur des importations et des exportations de céréales fourragères des pays en développement, de 1961 à 1989 - Valor de las importaciones y exportaciones de cereales-pienso de los países en desarrollo, 1961 a 1989

5. Value of meat imports and exports in developing countries, 1961 to 1989 - Valeur des importations et des exportations de viande dans les pays en développement, de 1961 à 1989 - Valor de las importaciones y exportaciones de carne de los países en desarrollo, 1961 a 1989

6. Value of dairy imports and exports in developing countries, 1961 to 1985 - Valeur des importations et des exportations des produits laitiers dans les pays en développement, de 1961 à 1985 - Valor de las importaciones y exportaciones de productos lácteos de los países en desarrollo, 1961 a 1985

Cow dung is an important source of fuel in many developing countries (Bharat) - La bouse de vache est une importante source de flammable dans maints pays en développement (Inde) - El estiércol de vaca es una fuente importante de combustible en muchos países en desarrollo (India)

Manure may exist used to produce free energy: here a simple plastic biodigester in use (the Philippines) - Le fumier peut servir à produire de fifty'énergie: ici, un digesteur en plastique de conception simple en fonction (Philippines) - El estiércol se puede utilizar para producir energía. En la foto, un sencillo biodigestor de plástico (Filipinas)

Draught animal power represents a great contribution past the livestock sector to the crop sector: oxen pulling a cart in a big sugar-cane plantation (the Dominican Republic) - La traction animale est une importante contribution de l'élevage dans le secteur agricole: boeufs tirant une charrette sur une grande plantation de canne à sucre (République dominicaine) - La fuerza de tracción animate being representa una contribución importante del sector pecuario al agrícola: bueyes tirando de un carro en una grande plantación de caña de azúcar (República Dominicana)

Conclusions

The following conclusions (come across as well Box 3) are drawn from this review of the function of animals in food production and agricultural development:

The contribution of animals to both agricultural and overall economical development has not been adequately evaluated. Official statistics grossly underestimate the contribution of livestock since many of import non-food outputs - most of which are difficult to quantify in monetary terms - are excluded.
Improved efficiency of animal agriculture, with its various commodities and service products, is crucial to achieving sustainable agricultural development and food security, specially in depression-income, food-arrears countries.

The role of animals in food and agricultural evolution programmes is underrated almost everywhere throughout the world despite the increasing demand, especially in developing countries, for all the different animal products and services.

A prerequisite for the sustainable development of beast agronomics is the identification, testing nether local atmospheric condition and promotion of appropriate technologies that utilise local and affordable resources.

Policies, infrastructure and support services enabling such technologies to succeed and reach small-scale farmers must be established.

The integration of livestock and agriculture increases both the short-term benefits and longer-term sustainability.

The livestock sector is both multifaceted and flexible enough to be able to react to changes in the national economy. Species of monogastrics and ruminants are available that are adapted to unlike local conditions and are able to use local resource to produce valuable products and services.

Greater emphasis should exist given to monogastric animals, equally they are the master suppliers of meat and have been largely neglected in development programmes. Care must be taken to employ alternative feeds that do not compete with man food. The importance of ruminants must non be forgotten, however, and particular attention is required to develop their role every bit a source of draught power.

Greater attending should exist given to the provision of facilities and credit that benefit the small-scale producer, rather than major investments in institutions and facilities, such equally large slaughterhouses, dairy plants and feedmills, which are usually oversized, overstaffed and overequipped.

BOX iii

Do all livestock projects fail?

Livestock projects accept a bad reputation amidst evolution banks and institutions, which take become reluctant to fund new projects. Information technology has been stated that: livestock consume cereals that would be amend used for feeding people; livestock cause environmental deterioration; livestock products are not indispensable in the nutrition; livestock projects are not viable in economic terms.

However, provided that the right technologies are identified and practical, taking into business relationship the local constraints, and that the appropriate support in expertise, the logistics for the supply of inputs and the marketing of animal products are ensured, livestock projects have proved to be very profitable, in both economic and social terms, on many occasions. The following are some spectacular examples of successful projects.

· Performance Flood in Bharat, which promotes dairy development among small or landless farmers, has established a modern and efficient dairy industry in that country. Similarly, in Uganda, a dairy projection has successfully developed milk production effectually Kampala nether difficult conditions, while small cheese-making units in the Niger accept provided several hundred women with jobs and income.

· The beef-fattening projection in the Hebei and Henan provinces of Prc. Past using local resources, such as cereal straw treated with urea, adequately supplemented with cottonseed cake, the farmers of these provinces have become the almost important beefiness producers of Prc. Strategies for on-farm testing and field support activities were similar (only applied on a much larger scale!) to those implemented in another successful beef-fattening project in northern Tunisia in the 1970s.

· The New Globe Screw worm (NWS) project in Due north Africa which, using environmentally safe biotechnology, successfully eradicated this threatening pest from the region in less than four years, has been a remarkable case of efficient organization and cooperation between donors and United Nations executing agencies.

It is now more widely recognized that livestock projects are every bit successful as any other agricultural projects, if not more than then.

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