Livestock industries, particularly those based on ruminant animals (sheep, goats, cattle) have been getting bad press for a while – greenhouse gases, landscape degradation, unhealthy products. It seems to me and my colleagues that it is time to have a more balanced argument about their role in the future of humanity.
http://www.nature.com/news/agriculture-steps-to-sustainable-livestock-1.14796
Agricultural land and food security are under pressure from climate change, population growth, urbanisation, and demand for biofuels and animal protein. In this context, we need to re-assess the role of ruminant livestock and focus on issues such as: Animal health, nutrition and welfare; Consumption of human food by livestock; Environmental footprint; Ensuring livestock species and genotypes are adapted to the local environment; Balancing food habits of humans.
I agree and one step would be to raise livestock that is best adapted to a particular geographical area. Under 300 mm of rain it make more sense to keep camels (and to promote camel husbandry) then cattle ! A vital issue in a climate warming world with decreasing and unreliable rainfall in vast areas. Millions of today pastoral people living in arid semiarid areas will have to replace cattle with camels if they wish to survive the next 50 years.
From a Western Australian winter rainfall and annual pasture plus ceral point of view. I am concered when I see Agricultural Scientist involvd with our sheep industry advocating high leveels of Lupins as a summer/autumn feed. The ram breeeders have their rams on self-feedeers with grain or pellts.
Of our locally grown grains lupins are exelent stock feed, they are also an unrecognised exelent human food. Basically if we want to justify conveerting high quality grain into animal protein the most efficint way is through pigs or poultry.
From my point of view the main justification for ruminants in our environmnt is to convert low quality vegetable matter to high quality animal protein. We should promote selecting ruminants for improveed efficiency in this area as well as their adoptations to the local environment.
John camels already possess the qualities you mentioned: efficiency in digesting low quality vegetable matter (and plants unpalatable to cattle), "gentle" grazing behavior (scattered similar to wild browsers: giraffe), soft feet and capability to utilize areas far from water points, etc . Because of their long calving interval camels are not very good as meat producing animals (although their meat taste like beef). However in arid areas as milk producing animals in free ranging conditions camels are unbeatable!
Thanks for the contribution, Fernando. The fibre-methane issue is important but it is a technical challenge, not a biological impossibility. We already have strong evidence that methane output is heritable (cattle and sheep) and that it can be substantially reduced with alternative forages. Moreover, sooner or later, the contribution of ruminants of global warming will be given a correct perspective, and we will also focus on 'emissions intensity' of the product (kg methane per kg product), rather than simple mass of methane produced, and this will drive efficiency.
This has been the subject of a special issue of the South African Journal of Animal Science Volume 43 Issue 3 (2013). You can go to www.sasas.co.za for the journal (Open Source)
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