Using data from satellite imagery, insurers can assess the impact of drought on the vegetation that livestock need to survive. Could this be a lifeline for Kenyan farmers? Continue reading
Typical long-horned goats of Abergelle Amhara, Ethiopia (photo credit: ILRI/Zerihun Sewunet). ‘Quantitative information on the importance of livestock systems in African drylands is scarce. A new study by Tim Robinson, of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), and Giulia Conchedda, of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), helps to redress this. The study … Continue reading
ILRI’s Tim Robinson maps the changing demand for livestock products and associated changes in production that will be required to meet future demand in African drylands. Continue reading
‘Timothy Robinson and his co-authors put together a series of maps showing the global distribution of various widely eaten animals. This map shows where the world’s pigs live, and makes the point that the taste for delicious pork varies widely around the world. North Americans, Europeans, and Chinese people all eat pigs, but China’s enormous … Continue reading
Wildlife populations are declining severely in many protected areas and unprotected pastoral areas of Africa, researchers from leading universities and international research institutes said. Continue reading
A recent paper that maps the global distributions of the world’s major livestock species has already been used to advance understanding of where surveillance efforts should be targeted to prevent the possible spread of a lethal bird flu virus now circulating in poultry populations in China, where it has killed 62 people. The original mapping work, led by Tim Robinson, of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), and published at the end of May, was immediately put to practical use in locating large regions in South and Southeast Asia that would suit the new lethal virus. Continue reading
The Butcher, by Marc Chagall, 1910 (via Wikipaintings). Should you become vegetarian to help mitigate against global warming? Well, you could, or you might try just eating less meat, if you’re one of some 1 billion people chronically eating too much food. On the other hand, you might try helping some 1 billion small-scale livestock … Continue reading
The farmyard, by Marc Chagall, 1954 (via Wikipaintings). Without big interventions, the future of food security looks bleak. So says an article in One Billion Hungry: Can We Feed the World Website. The clear message from . . . the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report is the urgent need for farmers to adapt to a changing … Continue reading
Tara Garnet, of the Food Climate Research Network (FCRN), at Oxford University, recently highlighted a paper published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The paper, Biomass use, production, feed efficiencies, and greenhouse gas emissions from global livestock systems, is written by livestock scientists at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI, Kenya) and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO, Australia). Continue reading
Typical smallholder’s farm in Busia, in western Kenya, where farmers mix crop growing with livestock raising (photo credit: ILRI/Pye-Smith). A team of scientists is collecting information on the level of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions produced by smallholder farmers. Scientists from CGIAR centres under the Climate Change Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) said the project’s key … Continue reading
