This report summarizes the results obtained during 1998/99 season related to the socioeconomic research component of Integrated Watershed Development Project in Mihassa. The Project aims at developing sustainable practices of water harvesting and water spreading techniques, under very arid conditions, to produce sustainable increases in the amount of forages, and to improve grazing and range lands available for sheep and goats. In 1989, the Syrian Government established, as a part of this project, Mihassa Research Station, which is located at about 130 km to the northeast of Damascus City.

Con el objeto de conocer las concentraciones sanguíneas de Triyodotironina (T3) y Tiroxina (T4) en vacas lecheras en el sur de Chile, se seleccionaron 110 muestras de sangre de vacas Frison Negro, 55 pertenecian a vacas al inicio de lactancia y 55 a vacas en el período final de gestación. Las muestras de sangre fueron obtenidas por punción yugular o coccígea en tubos heparinizados. El plasma obtenido por centrifugación fue mantenido a -20º C hasta el análisis.

This review explores environmental change in northern and south-central Kenya, roughly covering three decades from the 1960s to the 1990s. The report answers three questions:has vegetation change occurred in these districts?if vegetation change has occurred, why and how has this happened?what are the trends for livestock populations?The article concludes that:rangeland sites have been fundamentally altered by woody encroachment over the past 40 years.

One of the greatest challenges faced by mankind is to satisfy the needs of the fast growing global population and at the same time preserve land, water, air and biodiversity resources. Livestock are a crucial element in this balancing process. Demand for livestock products is growing fast, especially in the developing world. Livestock, through their multiple functions, are a cornerstone of the livelihood of most of the rural population in the developing world.

The relations in the sphere of the rights to use pastures on the territory of the Kyrghyz Republic shall be regulated by this Law, the Forest, Water and Land Codes, laws on lease and lease relations, protection of the nature, flora and fauna, atmospheric air and other legislation of the Kyrghyz Republic. The subjects for the utilization of pastures shall be juridical and natural persons. The objects shall be certain areas of pastures. The pasture areas shall have locations and boundaries both on the map and on the ground.

Livestock manure is an important source of nutrients for crop production in semi-arid West Africa. An assessment of the potential of manure to sustain crop production calls for an estimation of the amounts of manure that could be produced and captured and the feed resources required to maintain livestock used for manuring. This paper presents estimates of the amounts of manure produced by cattle, goats and sheep fed ad libitum under confinement. A model is presented to predict the yearly faecal output by grazing ruminants under fluctuating feed supplies.

This paper deals with foraging behaviour of cattle grazing semi-arid rangelands in the Sahel of Mali. It discusses the location of study site, vegetation in the grazing orbit, herd management and livestock behaviour. Results on seasonal variation in feed supply, selection of the annual grazing orbit in accessible land and of the daily route in the grazing orbit, selection of herbage mass patches within landscape units and selection of species are also presented in the paper.

Paper explores the relationships between the following concepts under the conditions of Middle Eastern semi-arid ecosystems. Paper states that there are two apparent contradictions in the title of this paper. First, grazing by domestic livestock is often considered to be hostile to nature conservation, especially in semi-arid areas (the ongoing conflict between ranchers and environmentalists in western USA is just one contemporary example of this).

Results from this study show that the over-used but under-researched association between grazing and land degradation in the Kalahari has been oversimplified. In typical Kalahari conditions, the ecological changes that have been brought about by grazing cannot be linked with more fundamental changes in ecosystem function. Basic soil processes appear relatively unaffected by grazing pressure outside the sacrifice zone, and there is no evidence to suggest that the resilience of the system has been affected through soil degradation.