Livestock trade is culprit in sleeping sickness spread

Posted on 25 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

Scientists baffled by the continued spread of sleeping sickness through Uganda have discovered that it is livestock markets that are driving the disease. A team from Uganda and the United Kingdom analysed the incidence of the serious Rhodesian form of sleeping sickness, which is carried by cattle, in two newly affected districts. They confirmed that … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Products / East Africa / Livestock / Markets / Trade

East Africa losing millions on exports of unprocessed leather

Posted on 25 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

Livestock experts want East African countries to invest more in the processing of hides and skins in order to increase revenue. Largely neglected as a village-based enterprise for arid and semi-arid areas, the experts argue that the leather sub-sector could inject additional revenue into regional economies through value addition. According to the permanent secretary in … Continue reading →

Asia / Livestock / Markets / Southeast Asia / Vietnam

Vietnam livestock industry under review

Posted on 25 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

The animal husbandry and poultry sectors will be reviewed and restructured so that they develop in a sustainable and competitive manner, an official said at a conference in HCM City yesterday. Hoang Kim Giao, head of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development’s Animal Husbandry Department, said under the Livestock Development Strategy, the country would … Continue reading →

Climate Change / Livestock

Wanted: Methane-free livestock

Posted on 24 Jan 2010 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

At first glance, the Riswick farm is just another modern agricultural facility: in the middle of broad cultivated fields stand recently built barns, similar to so many other farms across Europe. But Riswick is a model experimental farm in the small town of Kleve, located 460 kilometres southwest of Berlin and a few kilometres from … Continue reading →

Africa / Drought / East Africa / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Livestock

Equity Bank and UAP will insure Kenyan herders against drought

Posted on 24 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

Equity Bank Ltd. and UAP Insurance Ltd. will insure livestock in northern Kenya against starvation and are offering the first African insurance program that will use satellite images to predict drought. The index-based product will initially be sold to herders of camels, cows, goats and sheep in Kenya’s arid Marsabit district, the Nairobi, Kenya-based International … Continue reading →

Climate Change / Livestock

How cows (grass-fed only) could save the planet

Posted on 23 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

Ever since the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization released a 2006 report that attributed 18% of the world’s man-made greenhouse-gas emissions to livestock — more, the report noted, than what’s produced by transportation — livestock has taken an increasingly hard rap. Read more … (Time Magazine) Continue reading →

Drought / East Africa / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Livestock / Pastoralism / Research

Kenyan herders to be offered livestock insurance against drought

Posted on 22 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

Herders in northern Kenya who suffered large cattle losses during recent droughts are to be offered livestock insurance in a pioneering project that uses satellite imagery of available grazing to determine when payouts occur. The scheme, billed as a world first by the International Livestock Research Institute, is being launched today in the arid Marsabit … Continue reading →

Climate Change / Environment / Livestock

World veterinary agency to probe meat-climate link

Posted on 22 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

The world’s top authority in farm animal health announced on Thursday it would launch a study into the role of meat in climate change. The report, carried out by independent experts, is expected to be published “by the summer,” Bernard Vallat, head of the World Organisation for Animal Health, known by its French acronym of … Continue reading →

Livestock / Markets / Value Chains

Barriers to market entry, poor livestock producers and public policy

Posted on 20 Jan 2010 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

The main aim of this study is to provide an analytical framework for the assessment of barriers to market access for poor livestock producers that can be used for the development of public policy that works to the advantage of those poor producers that attempt to enter specific product markets. The paper proceeds to demonstrate … Continue reading →

Agriculture / Climate Change / Livestock / Livestock Systems

Report says grasslands can help combat climate change

Posted on 20 Jan 2010 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

A new report from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization says grasslands have vast untapped potential to limit climate change by absorbing and storing carbon dioxide. The report says proper land use can also help one billion people who depend on livestock. The United Nations report says if pastures and rangelands are properly managed, … Continue reading →