Livestock research requires ‘need based approach’

Livestock research requires ‘need based approach’

Dr.T.P.Sethumadhavan

In the era of Globalization, rapidly increasing demand for livestock products along with the changes in international trade is placing pressure on India's livestock sector both to expand and adapt. Analysis of the trends over the last three decades indicates that the growth in poultry and dairy sectors has exceeded the growth in cereal production. This may be due to rapid urbanization, population growth, rising levels of income and varying prices of livestock products. There are certain indications, which suggest that the demand led livestock growth is expected to continue and by 2020 more than 60 percent of meat and 50 percent of milk will be produced in the developing countries.

As I started working and involved in various capacities for the welfare of the farming community- as a Veterinarian, extension worker, farm journalist, and author of books, I grew mature to comprehend realities of the sweeping changes that are being made in the agrarian sector and the consequences of approaches in Farm journalism and rural development. The intricate connections between the different sectors involved in agriculture are turning more visible. The visibility and predictability of these connections are to decide whether agriculture is to remain sustainable or not? The accelerated changes in the field motivate me to search for answers.

One day a farmer aged around 75 years came to my Hospital with a bottle of his cow’s urine which was inseminated three months back and would like know whether the animal is pregnant or not? He was only a functionally literate. I conveyed him about the difficulty in reaching a confirmatory conclusion. Then he started arguing about the fingertip facilities available to detect pregnancy in human beings. Could we blame the farmer since India is the largest milk producing country in the world! Even though we have achieved spectacular growth in cross breeding, biotechnology, embryo transfer, etc this small technology to easily diagnose pregnancy in cattle has not yet been standardized. It is the need of the hour to develop a user friendly diagnostic kit so that farmers themselves can detect the pregnancy in cattle at an early period.

Mastitis is one of the important diseases which affect production in cattle. Annual economic loss due to mastitis in the country is more than INR 600 Crores. Even though it is due to variety of causative agents Escherichia coli, Streptococcus and Staphylococcus are among the common bacterial organisms affecting cattle. It is a fact that mastitis is caused by around 100 species of microorganisms and to formulate a vaccine is very difficult. At least can we think of formulating a vaccine against coli form mastitis where incidence rate is nearly 40 percent in the country? University of Wisconsin and MIT in United States are seriously pursuing research on these issues?

Among production oriented diseases Hypocalcaemia ranks first in crossbred cattle. Even though it is due to varied calcium phosphorus ratio, at the field level a kit to detect calcium phosphorus ratio just like Glucometer will be very much useful for early diagnosis and treatment of sub clinical hypocalcaemia in cattle.

Asian elephants, say the Heritage animal of India are on the verge of extinction. Musth is the major issue in the Southern states like Kerala and causes rising levels of Human elephant conflict where there are around 3500 Asian elephants of which 700 are domesticated elephants. Countries like United States and Canada have less than 280 elephants of which only 40 percent are Asian elephants. Currently our concern is to control elephants using tranquilization which won’t need a high-end research intervention. But developed countries are controlling musth using GnRH vaccines. Research works of Professor Henk of South Africa is really an eye opener in controlling musth in elephants. He along with a team of Scientists from Pretoria University formulated a protocol for controlling musth incidents in African Elephants. It is through injecting a GnRH vaccine quantity of testosterone hormone in tuskers can be reduced that will help to check the increasing incidences of Human-Elephant conflict.

All elephant rearing developed countries are practicing strategic elephant breeding programmes using Artificial insemination, Embryo transfer, Sexing of sperms, etc. Impaction and Tuberculosis are the common causes of death in captive Asian elephants of which Tuberculosis is having zoonotic importance also. Elephant Endotheiotropic Herpes viral infection is a global issue in elephants. More research works are needed in the areas of elephant musth, tuberculosis, EEHV and impaction in the country.

Increase in cost of production of livestock products is a major issue in the state. As the price of milk increases by 50 percent price of feed increases by 200 percent thus affecting the sustainability of farming practices. Studies on cost of production of milk, meat and egg are scarce. Studies on cost of production of livestock products based on different regions are needed to assess the breakeven prices and to benchmark market oriented strategies.

Research on environmental issues related to livestock production areas are acquiring momentum in the world. Some of the livestock farming enterprises in the country face environmental issues. A sustainable model to reduce environmental threats has to be designed through research.

Considering the nature of livestock development and its potential in securing the life of the disadvantaged, there is an urgent need to strengthen the delivery systems for veterinary services in resource limited areas.