Category Archives: Buffalo

How viable are schemes to give poor people making and selling ‘informal’ milk greater market access?
A4NH / AHH / Buffalo / Cattle / Consumption / Dairying / East Africa / Food Safety / Food Security / Human Health / ILRI / India / Kenya / Livelihoods / Markets / Nutrition / Policy / Pro-Poor Livestock / Report / South Asia / Tanzania / Trade / Value Chains

How viable are schemes to give poor people making and selling ‘informal’ milk greater market access?

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A new report from ILRI and IIED reviews the effectiveness of training and certification schemes designed to give small-scale ‘informal’ sellers of ‘raw’ and/or boiled or informally pasteurized milk and (in India) milk sweets greater market access in East Africa and South Asia. The report reviews such schemes in Kenya and Tanzania and in the state of Assam, in northwestern India. In all three countries, the informal sector dominates dairy marketing and trade and informal milk production and trade contribute significantly to the employment, livelihoods and nutrition of many millions of poor people. Continue reading →

Dairy: A tool to fight poverty—An interview with IFCN’s Torsten Hemme
Advocacy / Buffalo / Camels / Cattle / Climate Change / Dairying / Goats / Interview / Livelihoods / News clipping / Poverty / Pro-Poor Livestock

Dairy: A tool to fight poverty—An interview with IFCN’s Torsten Hemme

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Having scanned the scientific literature (100 journal articles) on the impact of milk production on reducing poverty, Torsten Hemme, managing director of the IFCN (International Farm Comparison Network) Dairy Research Center, in Kiel, Germany, says that dairy is improving lives in multiple ways. Continue reading →

A ‘milk start-up’ aims to modernize India’s massive informal dairy economy in Odisha State
Buffalo / Cattle / Consumption / Dairying / Food Safety / Human Health / India / Markets / News clipping / South Asia / Value Chains

A ‘milk start-up’ aims to modernize India’s massive informal dairy economy in Odisha State

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Venture capitalists have been increasingly active in India, though until recently nearly all of them have been looking to invest in Silicon Valley-like dot-coms. Odisha state, the heart of Mr. Misra’s proposed new dairy start up, is one of India’s least-developed regions, far off the radar screen even of investors based in the country. Continue reading →

Is promoting vegetarianism for all the world’s people a form of colonialism? just Euro-centric?
Advocacy / Buffalo / Camels / Cattle / Farming Systems / Food Security / Goats / Livestock Systems / Opinion piece / Policy / Rangelands / Sheep / Small Ruminants

Is promoting vegetarianism for all the world’s people a form of colonialism? just Euro-centric?

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The debate over whether a vegetarian diet is better for the planet is top of mind for many as news of water scarcity, climate change, and deforestation seem to worsen by the day. Sarah Taber, a US-based agricultural scientist added another angle to the debate earlier this month when she laid out the argument that calling vegetarianism and/or veganism a universally ‘better’ diet is a form of colonialist thinking. Continue reading →

Milk production: A nutritional buffer for households in times of conflict and other stress
Agri-Health / Animal Products / Buffalo / Cattle / CGIAR / Consumption / Dairying / Food Security / Human Health / Nutrition / PIM / Pro-Poor Livestock / Report / Research / South Asia / Vulnerability

Milk production: A nutritional buffer for households in times of conflict and other stress

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A new discussion paper from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) recommends that livestock-oriented policies to improve child nutrition be designed to mitigate the harmful impacts of conflicts or related events, such as climate change or natural disasters, and that doing so will lead to healthier, more resilient children and communities. Continue reading →

Winners of the Humidtropics Innovation Platform Case Study Competition
Agriculture / Animal Production / ASSP / Award / Buffalo / Cattle / Humid Tropics / HUMIDTROPICS / ILRI / India / Innovation Systems / Markets / Uganda

Winners of the Humidtropics Innovation Platform Case Study Competition

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Three projects on innovative farmers’ cooperatives, best farming practices in hilly areas and better marketing of milk were winners at recent awards for Innovation Platforms (IP) Case Study Competitions held in Kampala. Continue reading →

Agriculture / Animal Production / Asia / Buffalo / Crop residues / Crop-Livestock / Farming Systems / Humid Tropics / HUMIDTROPICS / Livelihoods / PIL / Southeast Asia / Vietnam

Is there an integrative role for livestock in agricultural systems? Positive insights from Vietnam

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I have just come back from Sapa, Vietnam, where I helped facilitate the launch meeting for the situational analysis of the CGIAR Humidtropics Research Program in northwest Vietnam. After the meeting, and to get a better idea of the situation of the farming systems we will be studying with our local research and development partners, I … Continue reading →

Buffalo / Cattle / Consumption / India / South Asia

As meat eating rises in India, sacred cows are sacred no more to cattle rustlers and slaughterhouses

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An Indian woman and cow on the steps of a temple (photo on Flickr by Marsh Gardiner, earth2marsh). As reported in the New York Times this week, a fundamental, if largely unspoken, cultural shift is occurring in India, where more and more Hindus, many of whom were vegetarian, as well as people rising out of … Continue reading →

Animal Production / Animal Products / Buffalo / ILRI / India / Markets / South Asia / Value Chains

Small-scale buffalo-keeping in India goes big time–With exports a quarter of world’s beef market

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Buffalo in a village homestead in the Himalayan foothills of northern India (photo credit: ILRI/Susan MacMillan). ‘Alas for the sacred cow: Beef exports from India are expected to surge 30 per cent this year, giving this country a quarter of the world market. ‘This is a good-news story in a lurching economy. Livestock industries, from eggs … Continue reading →