Progresses of Designing Community-Based Breeding Strategies for Indigenous Sheep Breeds of

Smallholders in Ethiopia (Afar Region)

Presented by Ashebir Kifle at the ICARDA-ILRI-BOKU Project Workshop on Designing community-based breeding strategies for indigenous sheep

breeds of smallholders in Ethiopia, Addis Ababa, October 29, 2010.

Background • Werer Agricultural Research Centre is one of the

14 research centres under the Ethiopian Institute

of Agricultural Research, EIAR

• It is found in the Afar Region and located at

about 275 kms East of Addis Ababa, the capital

city of Ethiopia

Cont…

Afar Region is located in the North-Eastern

part of the country.

It borders:

– Oromiya region in the south,

– Tigray region and Eritrea in the north,

– Djibouti and Somalia in the east and

– Amhara region in the west and its capital city is Semera.

Cont…• The altitude of the region ranges from 1500 m asl in

the western highlands to -120 meters below sea

level in the Danakil/Dallol depression (northern

parts of the region).

• The southern part of the region consists of the

valley of the Awash River, which empties into lakes

found along the Ethiopian-Djibouti border.

• Afar Regions is subdivided into five

administrative zones (Zone 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5) and

one special district (Argoba special district).

Cont...• the Region has a total human population of 1,411,092,

consisting of 786,338 men and 624,754 women.

• Of the total population, urban inhabitants are 13.4%

while the remaining 86.6% live in rural areas.

• The region has an estimated area of 96,707 square

kilometers with an estimated density of 14.59 people per

square kilometer (CSA,2007),

Cont...

• The main stay of the population of the region is livestock

production (pastoralism, transhumance )

• pastoralists migrate from place to place in search of feed and

water resources for their livestock.

• The Afar people have strong ties to their ecosystem and have

unique traditional values that promote harmony between

human, livestock and nature.

Cont...• The region endowed with high number of livestock

resources estimated to be 8,707,518 with a species

composition of :

– 2,688,734 Sheep,

– 3,229,761 Goats,

– 2,336,483 Cattle,

– 649,425 Camels,

– 52,401 chicken and

– 116,140 Equines (PARuDB Annual Report 2009).

Cont...

• The major role of livestock is for subsistence, cultural or social

functions and

• the major products from this system are milk and meat

(Jahnke,1982;1988).

• rangelands are the major livestock feed resources available in

the area.

Cont...• Ample opportunity exists in the country for the development of the

meat industry due to fast growing domestic and export markets.

• The annual off take estimation of 2007 indicated that :

10% for cattle,

35% for sheep,

38% for goats and

6.5% for camel .

• These results indicated that, the annual off take rate were far lagging

behind potential demands.

Cont...

• Projection studies between 2003 and 2007

indicated that pastoral areas were capable of

producing about 753 thousand cattle, 2.3 million

sheep, 5.5 million goats and 79 thousand camels

to domestic and export market (Asfaw and

Mhoamed, 2007).

• Despite such a potential, the production area is severely

stifled by;

low productivity,

high prevalence of diseases causing morbidity and mortality

rates and export ban,

weak extension and technology support,

poorly development of market infrastructures,

frequent drought and absence of effective prediction and

coping mechanism.

Cont...• Despite the fact that there is huge sheep population in the

region, little appropriate research has been conducted to

improve the production and productivity of Afar sheep and

hence the people had been getting not more than

subsistence income from their sheep production.

Therefore, Improving livestock production in the region is

of paramount importance to assure sustainable food

security of the pastoral community.

Cont...• In response to these problems, a project entitled

as"Designing Community-Based Breeding Strategies

for Indigenous Sheep Breeds of Smallholders in

Ethiopia (Afar)" is being implemented by ICARDA-

ILRI – BOKU in collaboration with WARC since 2007

at two kebeles of Amibara district in the Afar

Region.

The objectives of the presentation • To assess the progress of the project

• To indicate the limitations faced so far

• To forward Recommendations about the

future of the project activities

Progress /Achievements • The preliminary research activities on Afar sheep

were conducted by two M.Sc students and one PhD

student with the collaboration of the Livestock

research process at Werer Agricultural Research

center (WARC).

• However, the research center has takeover all the

activities under the research project since August,

2009.

Cont...• Two kebeles (Bonta and Halidege) were selected based on

accessibility, production system, sheep population, market

availability etc.

• Sixty households were selected from each kebele.

• A total of 3 Workshops were launched before the starting of

each student’s study.

• The purpose of the Workshops were to discuss with the

selected stock owner pastoralists and kebele and woreda

authorities to create awareness.

Cont...• Continuous trainings were given to the selected pastoralists about the

importance and potential impact of the study on their livelihood/

incomes.

• Three production traits (lamb survival ability, growth ability and milk yield)

that could improve sheep production were selected by the community

• Some of the selected pastoralists were reluctant for ear tagging their

sheep.

• Out of the 120 households, ear tagging was accepted by 53 and 46

households of Bonta and Halidege kebeles, respectively.

• In both kebeles a total of 1330 sheep were ear tagged.

Cont...• Different breeding records including birth weight , three month weight and

six month weight , milk yield and lamb survival) have been recorded by

pastoralist origin enumerators

• Four pastoralists were Trained on animal health (as community animal health

workers).

• Regular vaccinations and treatments were given to the project sheep (the

sheep at the project area).

• Two round ram selection were conducted (32).

• Different material such as bicycle, burdizo, medical treatments, vet

instruments and weighing scale were provided to the enumerators to

facilitate data recoding activities and vet services.

Major limitations

• Mobility ---since Pastoralists move from place to place in search of feed

and water for their livestock, this brings inconsistency in data recording

– mobility increases during drought.

• Difficulty of ear tagging ---The ear of Afar sheep is very small and this

makes ear tagging a little bit complicated.

Recommendations for the future project • The project should incorporate a well designed destocking program

(Creating commercial destocking linkage between producer and trader).

• Livestock disease prevention.

• Livestock feed and water development,

• range land rehabilitation including area enclosure, etc...

• effective drought prediction and coping mechanism Should consider in the

future project plan.