Genetic Traits of Relevance to Sustainability of Smallholder Sheep Farming Systems in South Africa

Abstract

Sustainable livestock production is important to ensure continuous availability of resources for future generations. Most smallholder livestock farming systems in developing countries have been perceived to be environmentally, socially and economically unsustainable. Farming with livestock that is robust and adaptable to harsh environments is important in developing countries especially in semi-arid and arid environments. This review discusses the different sheep farming systems employed by smallholder farmers and associated sustainability problems facing them. The review also gives an overview of sustainability indicators and limitations to the sustainability for the different smallholder sheep production systems in South Africa. It is argued that genetic diversity is important for sustainability and needs to be maintained in sheep for sustainable production and reproduction performance. The application of traditional breeding and genomics to ensure sustainable production is explored. Animal breeding approaches, specifically genomics can be applied to improve areas of environmental sustainability of smallholder sheep farming systems but must be targeted to the specific production environments, challenges, and opportunities of smallholder production. The genetic traits important for sustainability, the role of genomics in improving these traits and linking these genetic traits to different farming systems in South Africa are discussed.

Leveraging Available Resources and Stakeholder Involvement for Improved Productivity of African Livestock in the Era of Genomic Breeding

“…The initially domesticated sheep breeds in West Africa have also been genetically mixed with European breeds (Brahi et al, 2015). Using the OvineSNP50 beadchip, Molotsi et al (2017) reported that the smallholder Dorper sheep was introgressed with Namaqua Afrikaner, South African Mutton Merino and White Dorpers genes. They further reported that the smallholder Dorper population was more genetically diverse than the pure-bred Dorper, South African Mutton Merino and Namaqua Afrikaner.…”

Analysis of profit efficiency among smallholder sheep farmers of N8 development corridor Free State, South Africa

“…Smallholder livestock farmers play a major role in enhancing livestock production in South Africa. South Africa has an estimated 28.8 million sheep, of which 7.4 million are owned by smallholder farmers and 21.4 million owned by commercial farmers (Molotsi et al 2017). This shows that commercial farmers who produce and supply the local and international markets dominate the sheep industry in South Africa.…”

“…Factors such as, consumer preferences, changing lifestyle, globalisation, high population and income growth have increased the demand for sheep and sheep products in the local market (Rios et al 2009). Climate change especially drought and increasing production cost has slowed down sheep production in South Africa (Molotsi et al 2017). This gap between demand for and supply of sheep and sheep products has provided a great opportunity for integrating smallholder sheep farmers into the value chain (Ndoro et al 2015).…”

“…Previous studies have examined livestock production and market participation of smallholder livestock farmers in South Africa (Rios et al 2009;Mafukata 2015;Ndoro et al 2014;Ndoro et al 2015;Ngarava et al 2019;Molotsi et al 2017;Bahta and Bauer 2012), market factors inhibiting the competitiveness or profitability of smallholder farmers (Mpandeli and Maponya, 2014;Dlamini, 2014), technical efficiency and technological gap in sheep production (Nyam et al 2019).…”

The Current Status of Indigenous Ovine Genetic Resources in Southern Africa and Future Sustainable Utilisation to Improve Livelihoods

“…Some of these factors that hinder viable utilization of these ovine genetic resources in rural communities include poor feed resources, poor record keeping, lack of structured breeding programs, disease and health challenges, poor market access, ageing male farmers since the youth and females are unwilling to farm, as well as a lack of technical skills and knowledge. Smallholder farmers practice communal farming, or those benefiting from the land reform and redistribution program (LRAD) farm with the assistance of a mentor [38]. The mentor is a commercial farmer who already has a successful farming enterprise.…”