Aim: To study the factors affecting pig production in Nangabo Sub-County, Wakiso District, Central Uganda. Materials and Methods: A total of 11% (1350/12783) of all households in the Nangabo Sub-County kept pigs. The th systematic sampling technique was used to complete the list of all pig farming households. This was done by taking 10 farming household until 10% of all the farming households were sampled. A total of 135 farmers were interviewed with semistructured questionnaire. Questionnaire data was entered into Microsoft Excel worksheet and trans-ferred into Statistical Package for Social Scientists Results: Results indicated that 49.6 % of the pigs were raised in the semi-intensive system while 31%, 12% and 8% of the farmers kept pigs on intensive, tethering and free range rearing systems respectively. Farmers that raised their pigs on what is hereby referred to as semi-intensive and intensive management systems allowed their pigs up to five and two hours of open foraging respectively. Ninety eight percent of the farmers provided housing to their pigs and the commonest pig houses were local mud houses and a few of them were tree shades. Majority of farmers (85.2%) watered their pigs at least once a day. The major factors limiting pig production were; diseases and parasites mainly helminthosis and African swine fever (ASF). Others included; high costs of inputs, lack of capital, unstable availability of feed resources, inadequate advisory services and feed price fluctuation (maize bran, sow and weaner), lack of good quality breeding stock, poor and unorganized marketing, lack of enough land, high costs of veterinary medicines and inability to keep records. Additionally, lack of enough water and uncontrolled pig movement grossly limited the pig production in Wakiso district. Most Ugandans keep their pigs in periurban areas of Uganda. It was however, noted that there were important limitations for pig production in the country. To improve pig production and reduce animal protein deficit, knowledge on constraints to pig production was important to inform pig sector promotion stakeholders. Conclusion: Limitations to pig farming including parasites and diseases, ASF, nutritional deficiencies, high cost of inputs like building materials, drugs and veterinary services, inadequate capital and failure of farmers to access credit services, expensive feeds among others were identified and should be addressed to meet national animal protein requirements.

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Feed scarcity is a major challenge in smallholder production systems especially during the dry season. Sweet potato vines (SPV) contribute over 40% of the crop residues fed to dairy cattle but they are highly perishable resulting into losses of about 24% per season. Ensiling SPV mitigates seasonal feed shortages and assists in coping with seasonal feed price fluctuations. This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of sweet potato vines silage (SPVS) supplementation on the performance of lactating Ankole × Friesian crossbred dairy cattle. Four primiparous cows in early lactation were randomly allotted a basal diet of Rhodes grass (Chloris gayana) hay supplemented with dairy pellets and four graded levels of SPVS (0, 100, 200 and 300 g/kg of the daily ration) in a 4 × 4 Latin square design. The animals were given a one-week adaptation period followed by a two weeks data collection period for each diet. Dry matter intake (DMI), live weight changes, milk yield and composition were determined. Dry matter intake improved with addition of SPVS (P ≤ 0.05), with intake being highest (11.9 kg) in cows that were fed the highest SPVS level and lowest in cows that were not given SPVS (6.8 kg). Although animals on diets with 0, 100, 200 g of SPVS/kg of daily ration lost weight, there were no significant differences (P ≥ 0.05) in body weight changes across all treatments. Milk yield increased with SPVS supplementation by 1.5-1.7 kg per cow per day but there were no significant differences between the different SPVS supplementation levels. Milk fat and solids-non-fat differed (P ≤ 0.05) across the four diets but there was no consistent trend observed. Considering profit margins, supplementing dairy cows with SPVS at a level of 100 g/kg of daily ration was the most profitable at Uganda shillings 1290 (0.