Annual Report 2006/07 - ETH - North-South Centre North-South ...

ZIL research project, Phase IVProject leaderHaja Kadarmideen, ETH Zurich /CSIROContact personUlrike Janßen-TapkenCollaboratorJack Dekkers,Iowa State University, USADurationOctober 2003 – October 2007ZIL research projectsLivestocksystemsresearchAnimal production and healthDeveloping optimised cattle breeding schemes, with aspecial focus on trypanotolerance, based on the demands andopportunities of poor livestock-keepers – Genetic aspectsThe livelihood of resource-poor farmers in sub-Saharan Africadepends largely on livestock production. Cattle play a key rolein subsistence farming by converting resources like grass andcrop wastes that cannot otherwise be exploited into milk,meat, fertiliser, hides, building material and power for tractionor transport (among others). Trypanosomiasis, a protozoandisease transmitted by the tsetse fly, poses a majorthreat to the productivity of this mainstay in an area ofapproximately 10 million km 2 of Africa. Projects aiming tocontrol trypanosomiasis in livestock are mainly directedtowards vector control in combination with chemotherapy.Past experiences in many regions of the tsetse-belt haveshown that the attempts are not sustainable and need a frequentinput of labour and money to be effective. This projecttherefore focuses on the opportunity to exploit the feature oftrypanotolerance generally associated with short horn cattlefrom West Africa which would make farming in tsetse-flyinfestedareas possible with no or very limited aid of drugs orother control methods.community-sensitive multiplication and dissemination ofimproved livestock is expected to be sustainable becausegenetic gain persists in an individual without further input.Group discussion in Ethiopia (crop-livestock system)Bush fires to control the vegetation and to destroy the tsetse-fly habitat in EthiopiaSince different environments, production systems and culturesresult in different demands on cattle breeds, a fieldstudywas conducted to evaluate farmers’ preferences forcattle traits in three sites of Eastern Africa and to define theconditions for the development of a breeding programme inthat area.Population parameters for a cattle herd from a cross-breedingexperiment of N’Dama (trypano-tolerant taurine breed)with Boran (trypano-susceptible zebu breed) show a greatpotential of combining improved production capacity withtrypanotolerance in a synthetic breed by strategic breedingwith a selection programme that could even involve markerinformation to gain production potential without losingdisease tolerance. Applying a nucleus breeding scheme with37