Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
GENETIC RESOURCES: THEIR HABITAT
AND MANAGEMENT IN THE WORLD
Goats worldwide are subjected to diverse management
practices dependent on husbandry, breeding, productivity,
and disease status. Other factors include the interacting
infl uences of diet and environment within the habitat,
region, and country, and social and cultural attributes. The
present-day goat breeds have diverged considerably from
the original characteristics that remain in the wild goats.
This divergence is caused by the evolutionary forces of
mutation, migration, selection, and genetic drift under
varying environmental conditions. It is common to fi nd
goats in small or large multiple species herds (cattle and
goats) under nomadism and seminomadism in agropastoral
production systems and arid rangelands. Goats usually are
kept within the perimeter of farms, or in the vicinity of
homesteads of the small holder farming systems. These
animals have multiple functions and also have been used
to control brush and prevent forest fi res in North America.
Generally, the management practices of goats are tradi-
tional, socially tolerant, sustainable, and in harmony with
the natural vegetation and local environment. Goats con-
tribute to the effi cient use of labor surplus, help meet
household needs for food in small holdings worldwide, and
help alleviate poverty among the rural poor. In India goats
are called the poor man's cow.
In the developing countries of Asia, the poor in rural
areas raise a large number of small herds of goats. These
people use milk for home consumption and supplement
their income by selling goats or meat from surplus animals.
Goats survive on vegetation surrounding roads, irrigated
pastures and adjoining forest, agricultural by-products, and
vegetable toppings from kitchen waste. In Malaysia and
the Philippines, goats have been integrated with cropping
systems and fi sh farming, and this has increased production
of animal protein (Jalaludin et al., 1992; Libunao, 1990).
In contrast, in countries bordering the Himalayan mountain
range, the mountain people sustain their livelihood raising
goats together with sheep under a transhumance system
and nomadic pastoralists. Nomads with their goats and
sheep ascend to high mountainous pastures during the
spring and descend into the populated areas adjoining crop-
lands and irrigated pastures during the autumn. Farmers
raise goats in South China including the Hainan Island and
in the western plain of Taiwan in irrigated river basins.
In the Sahel region of Africa, nomadic tribes keep goats
to provide milk and meat, and move with them from region
to region in search of vegetation around oases, waterholes,
and irrigated lands. In the humid zone of West Africa and
the southeastern region of Nigeria, small numbers of goats
are kept in each household for milk and meat with minimal
managerial and labor input.
Countries along the northern coast of the Mediterranean
and in northern Europe concentrate on producing milk for
cheese production from large herds of goats. This contrasts
with the southern coast of the Mediterranean where meat
and meat products are the primary end products. Sedentary
goat keepers of Tunisia raise a few goats along with other
livestock adjacent to oases, receiving income from the sale
of meat while using milk for their own consumption. In
the eastern and southern regions of Algeria, large herds of
the Berber breed are kept for meat while the Arabe breed
is raised for producing both meat and milk.
Goats in the eastern U.S. consume diets rich in browse
and consume diets based on herbage. In Mexico, goats
graze on semiwoody brush rangeland but often are supple-
mented with concentrate feeds. In the north and west
central region of Argentina, large herds of Criollo (syn.,
Creole) and Anglo-Nubian goats are managed under exten-
sive husbandry (Angel-Neelem and Nellem, 1998). Creole
goats in Guadeloupe grazing on irrigated pastures are
highly productive under an accelerated kidding program.
The transition from goat keeping for sustenance to the
large-scale commercial enterprise common in cattle,
swine, sheep, and poultry illustrates the potential to
increase production effi ciency from goats. To date, com-
mercialization has only materialized in the dairy goat
industry. However, goats have been used as laboratory
animals for research and teaching and for production of
biological proteins.
An enormous diversity of goat genetic resources exists.
Of the 546 world goat breed populations reported by FAO
in 2000, 77 (14%) were found in Africa, 167 (30%) in Asia
and the Pacifi c region, 192 (35%) in Europe, 28 (5%) in
Latin America, 77 (14%) in the Near East, and 5 (1%) in
North America. This represents a colossal amount of vari-
ability in morphological characteristics and potential pro-
ductivity thereby providing an opportunity to exploit the
biological potential of goats through the application of
quantitative genetic principles to improve production effi -
ciency. Goat breeds have been selected for meat, milk,
prolifi cacy, pashmina (cashmere), and skins in countries
with climatic conditions that range from tropical and sub-
tropical to high mountains in dry, humid, and cold environ-
ments as listed in Table 3.1. The wide diversity of these
breeds in morphological characteristics and production
performance should have immense merit for selection and
genetic improvement.
Despite its importance, information about the productiv-
ity of breeds of goats is diffi cult to retrieve. Nevertheless,
