The African Cape buffalo is all but gone on the Mara ranches adjacent to Kenya’s Masai Mara Game Reserve; ‘The status of Masai Mara as a prime conservation area and premier tourist draw card in Kenya may soon be in jeopardy’—Joseph Ogutu (photo credit: ILRI/Elsworth). Matt Walker reports on the BBC this week that populations of … Continue reading
Min piglets at the experimental station at the Institute for Animal Science, in Beijing, China (photo credit: ILRI/Mann). Jeremy Cooke of the BBC reports in this video on a genetically modified pig, dubbed ‘Enviro-Pig’, being developed in Ontario that may be among the first of GM farm animals developed for human consumption. (Salmon genetically modified … Continue reading
Delia Grace, a veterinary epidemiologist with the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), works in Africa and South and Southeast Asia on livestock food safety and disease issues (picture credit: ILRI/Mann). With more than 6 billion people and over 20 billion livestock, the world is getting crowded—with risks increasing of livestock diseases causing devastating human as … Continue reading
A native chicken of Mozambique (photo credit: ILRI/Mann). Richard Black, the environment reporter at the BBC, reports from Nagoya, Japan, yesterday (18 October 2010) that delegates at the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity will consider adopting new set of targets for 2020 that aim to tackle biodiversity loss. ‘The UN biodiversity convention meeting has … Continue reading
The rapid growth in the global demand for bushmeat is leaving many African species facing the possibility of being eaten out of existence, says Mark Jones. In this week’s Green Room, he calls for western nations to do more to tackle the problem of illegal imports of bushmeat. Read more … (BBC) Continue reading
Girls stand in front of an AIDS awareness poster in West Bengal, India. (Photo credit: ILRI / Mann) ‘Eight Indian states account for more poor people than in the 26 poorest African countries combined, a new measure of global poverty has found. ‘The Indian states, including Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, have 421 million … Continue reading
Here is an old (July 2009) news item we missed. The dairy conglomerate Danone built a small factory in Bangladesh to make nutritional yogurt for the poor. Danone’s yogurt brand in Bangladesh is called Shoktidoi, which means energy in Bengali. ‘When French dairy food firm Danone ventured outside the troubled business climate of Europe and the … Continue reading
‘Some of the cattle cloned to boost food production in the US have been created from the cells of dead animals, according to a US cloning company. Farmers say it is being done because it is only possible to tell that the animal’s meat is of exceptionally high quality by inspecting its carcass. ‘US scientists are … Continue reading
In light of the continuing floods in Pakistan — which have caused widespread devastation and affected some 14 million people — UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called on donors to support a broad and potentially unprecedented aid campaign. UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs spokesman Maurizio Giuliano says that the number of people … Continue reading
The drought which has hit East Africa is wreaking havoc among the region’s pastoralists. Their herds of livestock have been decimated. Even the hardy camels are dying. Turkana District in northwest Kenya is a harsh environment at the best of times. Driving along the sandy roads with temperatures tipping 40C, the air coming through the … Continue reading
