How drought-resistant livestock can help farmers fight climate change

Somalis have lost millions of livestock as ongoing drought dries up water holes and leaves them with nothing to drink. In neighboring Ethiopia, more than 4.5 million livestock have died since late 2021 as failed rains parch grazing lands, while Kenyan farmers have seen profits plummet as emaciated animals fetch a pittance at the market. “The severity and the frequency of droughts seems to be getting worse here in the Horn of Africa and some other parts of the world,” said Iain Wright, deputy director of general research and development at the International Livestock Research Institute, or ILRI. “While droughts have been a common feature of dry land areas for centuries and millennia and pastoral systems have evolved over the centuries to deal with that, the pressure on those systems is getting greater.” “The animal is only as drought tolerant as the feed that you give it is drought tolerant.” --— Lauren Anderson, fellow, Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research Wright and other researchers are working to develop livestock that can better withstand harsh conditions and figuring out how to get such breeds to pastoralists that increasingly struggle with the fallout from climate change. Some animals, such as goats, are naturally more disposed to tolerating heat, so farmers have started to switch away from cattle, Wright said. Other species such as pigs struggle in the heat because they can only sweat 2% of their body heat. But pigs’ sensitivity could help researchers and farmers gauge when the temperature is reaching dangerous levels that could negatively impact other animals, according to Lauren Anderson, a fellow with the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research. “Pigs have that tight comfort zone,” she said. “Pigs are going to be a little bit like the canary in the coal mine for some of the other species that are going to be experiencing heat stress issues as temperatures rise.” Many large commercial farms are equipped with cooling technology — misters, fans, and ventilation — that help keep animals comfortable, but rural smallholders who keep their herds outside don’t have access to such things. Using excess water is also problematic if there are drought conditions, although some farms are designed to recycle water that is being used to cool animals. The World Poultry Foundation, or WPF, has received $26 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to expand the use of dual-purpose poultry, which are bred for both meat and eggs, in three countries. Typically, most small-scale producers in Africa — who make up 70% of poultry farmers on the continent — raise traditional breeds, which have high mortality rates, lower egg production, and slower growth rates. Dual-purpose birds are more resilient and more easily survive harsher conditions and can be forage fed, helping producers avoid expensive input costs like that of feed. Males reach market weight quicker, while females lay three to four times more than a traditional chicken. They're bred to look like familiar village birds so their appearance is less jarring than a fattened chicken, making it more likely that villagers buy them. “In terms of getting high quality protein to families that need it, it’s a lower footprint way to do it than traditional production methods,” said Maureen Stickel, director of international program development at the World Poultry Foundation. But it’s a challenge to get the birds to extremely rural areas because chicks require care to transport. WPF is developing a sustainable dual-purpose poultry value chain so producers can have reliable access to them, Stickel said. Because 80% of those who raise chickens in Africa are women, the initiative also focuses on ensuring they are involved throughout the value chain and can generate income. Yet while it is generally acknowledged that rainfall patterns in Africa are changing, Stickel said, incentives are needed for producers to use the new breed because “no one’s going to buy something they haven’t heard of.” This is particularly true for populations with little disposable income, who will be particularly judicious about chancing their money without witnessing the benefits. Udaya DeSilva of Oklahoma State University manages the world’s biggest compendium of livestock breeds, including information on their climate and drought resilience. He formed part of a study of over 800 animals to determine which can thrive with very little water. But there’s more to it than just drought resilience, said DeSilva. “How much do they grow? How much milk they produce. Are they resistant to parasites? And so on and so forth. You can’t just drop everything that you worked for thousands of years and essentially pick drought resistance. Then you lose everything else,” DeSilva said. It’s not just about access to water; animals can also become drought resilient by being hardy to the amount of feed they consume to stay alive, which can both come naturally to certain animals or be a bred trait. One large benefit of dual-purpose poultry, Stickel said, is their low feed needs. Animal feed, such as corn, that requires more water will also soon be out of reach of farmers in the driest areas, Anderson said. “The animal is only as drought tolerant as the feed that you give it is drought tolerant,” she said. “Sorghum has become more popular because it uses water really efficiently.” Scarce animal feed can also lead to conflict between pastoralists and agriculturalists, the International Livestock Research Institute’s Wright said, as pastoralists allow their livestock to roam increasingly large areas to find food, often trampling or eating crops. It’s also a challenge to convince farmers to raise fewer, more productive animals because in some cultures the size of a herd demonstrates wealth and status, he said. ILRI partners with local organizations and governments to help reach pastoralists with these messages. Animals from the Middle East, for example, are already able to survive on less water than breeds native to the tropics, DeSilva said. But introducing resilient animals from one part of the world to another brings its own risks. They can introduce new parasites or be susceptible to those they have never been exposed to. “The most reasonable strategy is to breed those traits into existing populations,” DeSilva said. That can take years, however, before such animals are widely available. The stakes are high for areas such as the Horn of Africa, Wright said. Millions of people have been displaced and malnutrition is widespread as they can do little to keep their animals alive. But while funding for research on drought-resilient livestock is limited, the return on investment is clear because it’s cheaper to plan for drought than face a humanitarian emergency after it’s struck, he said. “Can we be more proactive? Can we get better early warning systems so that people can plan?” Wright asked. “There’s a lot of awareness in governments and the international community about how do we get better at planning for drought and mitigating the effects before it hits.”