PHOTO: GEORGINA SMITH, ILRI
PHOTO: ILRI
HEALTH ▶▶▶
in livestock in the tropical region. This could worsen the food and nutrition security situation.” An Notenbaert at the Alliance of Bioversity International and International Center for Tropical Agriculture, and co-author of the study, added that the team knew climate change would bring problems for animals; however, they were surprised by the magnitude of change. “Climate change mitigation and ad- aptation measures absolutely need to be factored into deci- sions and strategies for livestock production,” Notenbaert said.
Increasing resilience in the dairy sector The research team believes that well-targeted and evi- dence-based climate adaptation – including identifying and making available productive animal breeds that are adapted to heat – will enable livestock production to continue and ex- pand across East Africa. Countries like Rwanda and Kenya have moved towards using exotic breeds to meet the grow- ing demand for milk in their countries because these breeds are more productive. “Holstein Friesians, a popular imported breed, are not indigenous to Africa. Although they produce more milk than local breeds, they do not cope well with heat,” noted Notenbaert. Despite progress in genetic selection practices through phe- notypic traits, and more recently by genomic approaches, there are still important steps to be taken, including crosses of indigenous and exotic breeds that retain the desired char- acteristics of each: adaptations to the local climate, feed and disease conditions from the indigenous breeds and increased productivity from the exotic breeds. “To make livestock production more environmentally effi- cient, we need breeds that can cope with rising temperatures and still produce more meat and milk,” added Notenbaert. In addition to breeding, countries need to look to other miti- gation strategies to increase resilience. This could be in the form of shelters or other means of shading to shield animals and ensure sufficient water access.
Dairy farmer, John Ngasha, in Nakuru, Kenya.
Figure 1 - Trends in the percentage of days with Severe/Danger heat stress during the historical period 1981-2010. Stippling indicates that trend values are significant at the 95% confidence level. Source: Rahimi et al. 2021.
Eritrea No trend Increasing trend
Significant at the 95% confidence level
Uganda
Rwanda Burundi
Tanzania Kenya South Sudan
Ethiopia Djibouti
Somalia
Zambia
Malawi Mozambique Zimbabwe Madagascar
The researchers cautioned that the study only examined the direct consequences of climate change on animals, but that other climate change impacts and climatic parameters such as temperature, humidity, solar radiation and rainfall patterns have important direct or indirect influences on diseases, parasitism and feed resource availability and also need to be taken into consideration.
Dairy farmer in Dodoma, Tanza- nia. The live- stock sector in East Africa is an integral part of agricultural sys- tems in the region.
42 ▶ DAIRY GLOBAL | Volume 8, No. 2, 2021
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