Category Archives: Film and video

Drought / Drylands / DRYLANDSCRP / East Africa / Film and video / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Pastoralism / Pro-Poor Livestock / Somalia / Vulnerability

ILRI scientist Andrew Mude interviewed on CNBC Africa television: ‘Increase investments in the pastoral livelihood’

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Andrew Mude of ILRI receives the best practice award for an Index-based Livestock Insurance project in northern Kenya that he leads (image from The Poverty Reduction, Equity and Growth Network [PEGnet] conference in Midrand, South Africa, 2–3 Sep 2010). As hunger spreads among more than 12 million people in the Horn of Africa, a study … Continue reading →

Drought / Drylands / DRYLANDSCRP / East Africa / Film and video / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Pastoralism / Vulnerability

Insured livestock keepers in Kenya may receive first insurance payments

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In Kenya’s drylands, drought has always been the greatest hazard faced by livestock herding families. Modern pressures are making this situation worse. This film tells the story of a research project started in 2007, which in 2010 introduced a new form of insurance to remote herding peoples who had never been provided with insurance before. … Continue reading →

Animal Breeding / Biodiversity / Film and video / Genetics / Indigenous Breeds

FAO to finance national projects enhancing livestock diversity

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Livestock genetic diversity is key to global food security; this is the native black pig of the mountainous region of northern Vietnam (photo on Flickr by Rock Portrait Photography). ‘Germany, Norway and Switzerland have contributed a first donation of $1,000,000 to a new, FAO [United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization]-managed fund designed to help developing … Continue reading →

Animal Breeding / Animal Diseases / Cattle / East Africa / Film and video / Genetics / ILRI / Indigenous Breeds / Kenya / Sheep / Small Ruminants

Australian TV program highlights research in race against time to save Africa’s ‘hairless sheep’ and other native breeds

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Worm-resistant red Masai sheep, an indigenous ‘hairless’ sheep kept by Maasai herders, in Kenya (photo credit: ILRI). Catalyst, the Australian Broadcasting Company’s well-regarded science television program, yesterday (14 Jul 2011) broadcast an episode on research being conducted in Kenya to conserve the native livestock of Africa. Okeyo Mwai, an animal geneticist working at the International … Continue reading →

Africa / East Africa / Film and video / ILRI / Knowledge and Information / Livestock / Niger / PIM / Policy / Project / Research / Tanzania / Uganda / West Africa

Improving livestock data in Africa–Policy perspectives

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The ‘Livestock Data Innovation Project’ is a three-year project to pilot and develop ways to identify, collect and analyze livestock data in three countries: Uganda, Tanzania and Niger. In its second year, representatives of several partners in the organization share their video perspectives on livestock data and its management. Here Kristin Grote from the Bill … Continue reading →

Animal Diseases / Cattle / Diagnostics / Disease Control / Epidemiology / Ethiopia / Event / Film and video / ILRI / Vaccines

It’s official! FAO declares rinderpest vanquished

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Cow bell from Kenya, on loan from Gary K Clarke, Cowabunga Safaris (photo by Topeka & Shawness County Public Library on Flickr). This week, as the New York Times reports below, the United Nations officially declared that, for only the second time in history, a disease has been wiped off the face of the earth. The … Continue reading →

Animal Production / Asia / Film and video / ILRI / India / Livestock Systems / Markets / Pigs / Project / Research / South Asia

Living livestock research: Towards policies for people and pigs in northeast India

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For the past several years, the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) has worked on a project to better livelihoods through improvement of livestock production and marketing in northeast India that is funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). In this 8-minute video, ILRI’s Pier-Paolo Ficarelli, a knowledge management specialist based in India, reports … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Diseases / Article / Biotechnology / Cattle / Disease Control / Film and video / Genetics / ILRI / Zoonotic Diseases

Livestock genes identified to unlock protection from animal plagues

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West Africa’s ancient (humpless) N’Dama cattle (white) are genetically resistant to the disease trypanosomosis while East Africa’s Improved Boran (humped) cattle are susceptible to this tsetse-transmitted disease (photo credit ILRI/Elsworth). Xinhuanet, the Chinese Xinhua News Agency online service, reports on an international research team that used a new combination of approaches to find two genes … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Diseases / Biotechnology / Cattle / Film and video / ILRI / Indigenous Breeds / Kenya / Research / UK / Zoonotic Diseases

‘New science’ is ‘networked science’: The data-crunching workflows and pipelines behind a recent gene discovery

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The single-celled parasite Trypanosoma brucei (appearing in blue), which causes sleeping sickness in humans and trypanosomiasis in livestock, amongst the red blood cells of its mammalian host (photo credit: Parasite Museum website). Having been domesticated in Africa some 8,000 or more years ago, the N’Dama, the most ancient of African cattle breeds, has had time to … Continue reading →