Livestock and Gender: A Winning Pair
No hay miniatura disponible
Fecha
Título de la revista
ISSN de la revista
Título del volumen
Editor
Resumen
Descripción
The involvement of women in livestock production is a long-standing tradition all over the world, in Europe as well as in Africa, Asia and the Americas. Livestock patterns differ widely among ecological zones, and socio-political systems. Livestock production systems can be divided in four major categories (Niamir, 1994): Nomads or transhumants, agropastoralist, intensive crops and livestock, and peri-urban intensive systems. In addition, there are some not-so-obvious livestock systems. In devel oping countries, the majority of livestock raisers are agropastoralists, deriving their incomes from both livestock and crop production. Agropastoral systems refer to a wide range of production systems, from the semi-nomadic to the sedentary. The difference between agropastoral and intensive crop and livestock systems is that the former consists of larger herds and usually relies on some kind of communal pastures or rangelands. Agropastoral societies in Africa have in general more total numbers of livestock than in transhumant ones, but the livestock ownership per capita is higher among transhumants. However, there are many exceptions to this rule. Intensive crop and livestock systems are more popular as land shortages force agropastoralists to intensify their production. Such systems have fewer animals per household than other categories, and often rely on fodder production or crop residues and by-products. In Asia, where often land shortages are severe, there are fewer transhumant an d agropastoral systems. The typical livestock production system is a smallholding integrated intensive crop-livestock farm.