Prof J W Ng’ambi
University of Limpopo, South Africa
The Department of Agriculture and Animal Health in the College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences invited Professor J W Ng’ambi as the African visiting scholar of the month on 21 September at the Florida Campus.
The paper focuses on the potential for goats to reduce poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa. It offers information on the present status of goat populations and their productivity. The current systems of production are described. The social and economic roles played by goats in food security and income generation are considered. The potential of goats in food production is discussed in terms of productivity, economic importance and potential for increasing food production in Sub-Saharan Africa. The rising demand for animal products from increasingly wealthy urban elites also offers a tremendous opportunity for goat farmers to share in the growing wealth of urban centres.
Goats have played multiple roles in the support of mankind for over 7000 years (Aziz, 2010). While goats were originally domesticated in southwest Asia they quickly moved into Africa and now can be found in every environment on the continent. Goats are deeply embedded in almost every African culture and are true friends to the rural people of Sub-Saharan Africa in particular (Peacock, 1996). However, while the widespread cultural acceptance of goats and goat products forms a sound basis for development there are many physical, economic, social and political constraints to developing goats in Sub-Saharan Africa. This paper will focus on the unique role and potential of goats in sub-Saharan Africa to improve the livelihood of the people. After all, Nelson Mandela herded goats as a young boy in the Eastern Cape, drank their milk and look at his achievements!
Goat breeds
There are a number of goat breeds in Sub-Saharan Africa. These can be grouped into meat goats (a number of indigenous goat breeds, Boer goat, etc.), milk goat breeds (Saanen, Alpine, Toggenburg, etc.) and mohair breeds (Angora goat) .
Uses of goats
Goats are generally kept for their milk, meat, hair (mohair, cashmere) and skins. However, goats provide their owners with a broad range of products and socioeconomic services and have played an important role in the social life of many African people , being used as gifts, dowry, in religious rituals and rites of passage (Peacock, !996). Goats may also be used for controlling bush encroachment. There is, however, a potential for obtaining additional income by value-adding operations including the manufacture of goat leather products such as handbags, slippers and key chains, goat meat products such as spiced meat cuts, and milk products such as drinking yoghurt, cheese and amasi (FARM-Africa, 2004; Peacock, !996 ).
Goat production statistics
Accurate statistics are required to determine the future outlook of the goat populations and their productivity. They are also needed before any improvement policies can be planned on a realistic basis and implemented with confidence. Table 2 presents numbers of goat populations in different parts of the world (FAO, 2011). The world total numbers of goats were 861.9 million. There are tremendous variations among the different parts of the world regarding the number of goats. The largest number of goats is observed in Asia, followed by Africa, representing about 59.7% and 33.8% of the total number of the world, respectively. The top ten countries have approximately 65.7% of the world total number. Seven countries of this list are in Asia, and the rest are in Africa. The largest number of goats in the world is in China, followed by India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, all of them are in Asia. The number of goats in these four countries constitutes about 45% of the world total. Number of goats in the world has been increasing since 1990 by about 1% to 4% each year (FAO, 2011).
Dairy goats produce about 15.2 million metric tons of milk, accounting for about 2% of the world total amount of milk produced by livestock species. The developing countries produce approximately 83% of the total amount. In Europe, goat breeding is strongly oriented towards milk production, with only 3% of the world goat population producing about 15% of the world’s goat milk, which is mostly used for cheese production. Table 3 shows the amount of goat milk produced by the top ten countries in the world, along with the total number of dairy does and the average of milk produced per doe per lactation (FAO, 2011). The largest amount of goat milk is produced in India, followed by Bangladesh and Sudan. There are three European countries in the list producing a considerable amount of goat milk: Spain, France and Greece. These three countries produce similar amounts of goat milk. In France, interest in dairy goats has led to the establishment of organized programs for selection, processing and commercialization of goat milk, which is produced mainly from Saanen and Alpine breeds. France leads the list in terms of the annual milk production per dairy doe, while Iran reports the lowest milk production per dairy doe. China has the largest total number of goats in the world, but they are mainly kept for meat production. Milk production per dairy doe ranks third, behind France and Spain. China officially reports 1.4 million dairy goats producing 0.3 million metric tonnes of milk (FAO, 2011). The dairy goat industry has great potential for further growth. It has grown partly because of a trend towards self-sufficiency by rural people, especially in developing countries, where goat milk can help to improve the nutrition of millions of people. In developing countries, much of the milk produced by goats is for family consumption, but goat milk can also be further processed into a variety of marketable products. In Sub-Saharan Africa marketing of goat milk and its products is still in its infancy. Less than 5% of the total milk produced by goats is marketed (Aziz, 2010; FAO, 2011).
