Industry benefits from recent genetic progress in sheep and beef populations

Abstract

An analytical model that evaluates the benefits from 10 years of genetic improvement over a 20-year time frame was specified. Estimates of recent genetic trends in recorded traits, industry statistics and published estimates of the economic values of trait changes were used to parameterise the model for the UK sheep and beef industries. Despite rates of genetic change in the relevant performance-recorded breeding populations being substantially less than theoretical predictions, the financial benefits of genetic change were substantial. Over 20 years, the benefits from 10 years of genetic progress at recently achieved rates in recorded hill sheep, sheep crossing sire and sheep terminal sire breeding programmes was estimated to be £5.3, £1.0 and £11.5 million, respectively. If dissemination of genetic material is such that these rates of change are also realised across the entire ram breeding industry, the combined benefits would be £110.8 million. For beef cattle, genetic evaluation systems have been operating within all the major breeds for some years with quite widespread use of performance recording, and so genetic trends within the beef breeds were used as predictors of industry genetic change. Benefits from 10 years of genetic progress at recent rates of change, considering a 20-year time frame, in terminal sire beef breeds are expected to be £4.9 million. Benefits from genetic progress for growth and carcass characters in dual-purpose beef breeds were £18.2 million after subtraction of costs associated with a deterioration in calving traits. These benefits may be further offset by unfavourable associated changes in maternal traits. Additional benefits from identification and use of the best animals available from the breeding sector for commercial matings through performance recording and genetic evaluation could not be quantified. When benefits of genetic improvement were expressed on an annual present value basis and compared with lagged annual investment costs to achieve it, the internal rate of return (IRR) on the combined investment in sheep and beef cattle was 32%. Despite a much higher rate of participation in performance recording, the present value of benefits and the IRR were lower for beef cattle than for sheep. The implications of these results for future national and industry investment in genetic improvement infrastructure were discussed.

Gene flow in a national cross-breeding beef population

“…Therefore, assuming a total of 91 000 NS beef breeding bulls total translates to approximately 20 000 breeding bulls entering service each year. This is similar to the study by Amer et al (2007) Table 9 at approximately 8000 (BLCS, 2009). The pedigree registration of a bull is not a guarantee that it will become a breeding animal.…”

“…On the positive side, the 1990s also saw the introduction of bet linear unbiased prediction (BLUP)-based genetic evaluation, which has given breeders a powerful and objective tool to aid genetic improvement (Amer et al, 1998). Correspondingly, the rate of genetic gain in key traits has seen an increase since the implementation of BLUP -E-mail: Darren.Todd@sac.ac.uk (Amer et al, 2007). Nevertheless, in 2010, beef production remains a secondary enterprise on many farm holdings (Lowman, 1998;Defra, 2008a), with an average herd size of just 28, and profitability is largely dependant on subsidy support (Riddell, 2005;Defra, 2008b).…”

Index selection in terminal sires improves early lamb growth1

“…These matings produced flocks of Scottish and Welsh Mules, respectively, described previously (van Heelsum et al, 2003(van Heelsum et al, , 2006Mekkawy et al, 2009). A description of genetic evaluation system, and genetic progress in UK sheep, can be found in Amer et al (2007).…”

Where in the beef-cattle supply chain might DNA tests generate value?

“…In a study of American Red Angus, it was found that 3% of the total herds in the breed association were supplying animals represented as grandparents in the pedigree (Marquez et al 2010). The low reproductive rate of beef cattle means that there is a relatively large number of elite breeding females in the nucleus sector as compared with pigs and poultry (Amer et al 2007). Even so, it has been estimated that less than 5% of cows belong to the bull-breeding sector (Garrick and Golden 2009).…”