Effect of current livestock feed sourcing and feeding strategies on livestock water productivity in mixed crop-livestock systems of the Blue Nile Basin highlands of Ethiopia

Drought has detrimental impacts on crop and livestock farming systems worldwide, but less attention has been given to outdoor livestock systems, particularly in humid temperate regions. This research evaluated how an intense drought in 2018 impacted the UK livestock sector and the responses adopted by key actors, though a combination of analysis of weekly agricultural trade publications and semi-structured interviews with livestock farmers.

Livestock farming systems have an important role in the territorial systems of the Mediterranean, but in the last twenty years the sector has undergone serious changes with an important decrease in the number of farms. The purpose of this study is to show the contribution of a local food certification to the resilience of peri-urban livestock farming system and of its food supply chain at territorial level.

Diversified livelihoods combining farming, livestock keeping and non-farm income are characteristic of many rural households worldwide. For the Central Asian and Caucasian region, livestock keeping is especially important in terms of land use and socio-cultural heritage.

This study presents an integrated examination of both the ecosystem services (ES) and ecosystem disservices (EDS) associated with smallholder animal husbandry in rural livelihoods in three villages in southeast South Africa. It recognises the contribution of ES supporting and resulting from smallholder livestock and poultry production, but also details the limiting factors or EDS, such as tick-borne disease, birds of prey or unpalatable rangeland, produced by the same system.

Recently, improving technical efficiency is an effective way to enhance the quality of grass-based livestock husbandry production and promote an increase in the income of herdsmen, especially in the background of a continuing intensification of climate change processes.

Farm abandonment and over-extensification trends in less-favored livestock breeding areas in the Mediterranean have led to socio-environmental issues that are difficult to assess and address, due to the characteristics of these areas (e.g., poor data availability and reliability). In a study case that presents many of the characteristics common to these areas, we combine qualitative and quantitative approaches to assess (i) the relationship between livestock production and land-cover change and (ii) the drivers of farmer decisions, concerning the types of livestock they breed.

Despite mobile livestock grazing being widely recognized as one of the most viable and sustainable land uses for semi-arid savanna, which can deliver clear wildlife conservation benefits, the levels of pastoral sedentarization and transitions to agricultural livelihoods continue to rise in many pastoral communities across the world. Using questionnaire interviews with community elders, our study assessed changing trends in livestock grazing, wildlife conservation, and sedentarization levels from the 1960s to the present day across three savannas in southern Kenya.

The stabling of livestock farming implies changes in both local ecosystems (regeneration of forest stands via reduced grazing) and those located thousands of kilometers away (deforestation to produce grain for feeding livestock). Despite their importance, these externalities are poorly known. Here we evaluated how the intensification and confinement of livestock in Spain has affected forest surface changes there and in South America, the largest provider of soybeans for animal feed to the European Union.

In the context of current agrarian reform efforts in South Africa, this paper analyses the livelihood trajectories of ‘emergent’ farmers in Eastern Cape Province. We apply a rural livelihoods framework to 60 emergent cattle farmers to understand the different capitals they have drawn upon in transitioning to their current class positions and associated vulnerability. The analysis shows that, for the majority of farmers, no real ‘transition’ from subsistence farming has occurred.

Livestock mobility was an essential characteristic of Kazakh livestock production systems, allowing animals to take advantage of spatial and temporal variability in climate and vegetation, optimising forage intake over the year. These systems broke down following the end of the Soviet Union. In this paper we examine the extent and determinants of the recovery of mobile livestock husbandry in south-eastern Kazakhstan, using surveys and semi-structured interviews with livestock farmers and rural households (holding livestock but not registered as farms).

In June 2018;the President of Burkina Faso enacted a new agriculture investment code;aiming at promoting productive investments in livestock;fisheries;forestry and fauna management. It establishes an enabling environment and creates incentives to boost investment in the targeted sectors. Despite some shortcomings that can be fixed through implementation;the code is an important step in the right direction to attract responsible investment.