Son La province has recently put in place policies and programs to support expansion of livestock production, however the province still faces low livestock productivity due to low quality and availability of forages and feedstuff. One of the provincial government’s priorities is to increase productivity of cattle and pigs through improved animal nutrition practices such as increased cultivation of improved forages and better feed management and utilization.

The training targeted youth and women sheep fattening groups, aiming to enhance their knowledge and skills in optimizing feed management practices. ICARDA partnered with the National Agricultural Research Centers of Areka, Bonga, and Debre Berhan to deliver the training sessions. The objective of the trainings was to equip participants with the necessary expertise to formulate balanced sheep diets and efficiently process feed, thereby improving sheep productivity and promoting sustainable livestock feeding practices.

Tanzania smallholder dairy is constrained by lack of access to high yielding and locally adapted genetics. To improved dairy genetics Artificial insemination (AI) is the best tool to use. However, uptake of AI services is variable across the country. Information on individual animals born through AI and their performance levels within the different environments are lacking, hence difficult to evaluate the performance of the progeny born from AI bulls and to select best genetics.

The world population of 8 billion people creates alarm for more food demand, hence the need to increase productivity per available resources. It is pointed out that 50% of Africa’s population are youth below 25 years, meanwhile, 66.1% of total population (61million) of Tanzania youths aged between 15-24 years are participating in the national labour force. Therefore, youth involvement in the dairy value chain is inevitable.