Productive and economic performance of endemic N’Dama cattle in southern Mali compared to Fulani Zebu and their crossbreds

Contribution of cattle of different breeds to household food security in southern Mali

“…3). This also coincides with our previous observation (Traoré et al 2018) in which the values of milk consumed and sold, as well as milk offtake per cow, were higher for households keeping Zebu and mixed herds compared to N'Dama and crossbred herds. In addition to the direct contribution of milk for own consumption (Yigrem et al 2015), higher milk off-take in Zebu and mixed herds might have contributed indirectly to improve food security through the increased daily cash income, which allows households to access a more diversified diet as also reported by Kidoido and Korir (2015).…”

“…More milk for home consumption and increased income through the sale of animals and milk also resulted in better nutrition in households that upgraded their indigenous goats to crossbreds in the frame of the FARM Africa Goat Improvement Project (Peacock 2008). Moreover, owing to the larger body size of their Zebu and crossbred cattle fetching higher market prices (Traoré et al 2018), Zebu and mixed herd owners would see their purchasing power and food access enhanced compared to households with N'Dama cattle. In addition to milk, the households keeping mixed herds had a higher quality diet through an increased intake of meat (Fig.…”

Determinants of breeders’ participation to an indigenous cattle breeding program

“…In fact, the dairy production of N'Dama cattle rarely exceeds 2 L per day, which appears low compared with that of zebu cattle (Traoré et al 2018). With such production performance gap, crossbreeding appears as a more effective and rapid strategy for improving cattle productivity, which has been particularly shown for milk in Africa (Traoré et al 2018). From descriptive statistics, 88% of breeders mixing N'Dama and other genetic types were non-participants against 64% of current participants and 60% for resigning breeders (Table 1), although these differences were not significant (p = 0.06).…”

“…Sale may also intervene as a tool to manage herd composition in terms of age and sex or as a reaction to animal diseases or injuries, thus reinforcing the link between offtake and herd size. This savings and insurance role is then rather played by resistant indigenous breeds, showing lower individual value, in both purebred and mixed herds (Stear et al 2001;Traoré et al 2018;Camara et al 2019). The lower individual value comes as an explanation for the preferential destocking of these indigenous animals, which also means that more animals have to be sold to cover a given expense compared with crossbreds.…”

“…This apparent discrepancy may be understood as pointing to the ongoing transformation of production systems in the zone, breeders showing a willingness to evolve towards milk production and considering N'Dama as not suited to this goal (Camara et al 2019). In fact, the dairy production of N'Dama cattle rarely exceeds 2 L per day, which appears low compared with that of zebu cattle (Traoré et al 2018). With such production performance gap, crossbreeding appears as a more effective and rapid strategy for improving cattle productivity, which has been particularly shown for milk in Africa (Traoré et al 2018).…”