Performance of the sheep breeders' cooperatives in Ethiopia

Abstract

Ethiopia priority country project is a 3-year project designed to consolidate the individual pilot interventions CRP research has been implementing since 2012 and translate that into a pilot integrated package. The project will generate evidence needed to attract development investment to take the intervention packages to scale by national development partners. Genetics is one of the intervention packages which was included with the rational that small ruminant producers in Ethiopia had little or no access to genetically improved sheep and goat breeding animals. There was little capacity and skills and no supporting infrastructure in the national system to support breeding programs for smallholder sheep and goat producer. ICARDA and ILRI have worked on community-based breeding programs in Ethiopia since 2009. Successes and still existing challenges are well documented. The focus in this project is to make sure that improved genetic material from CBBPs reach the base population. Genetics flagship has three major areas of intervention in the SMaRT pack: (1) Access to improved sheep/goat genetics through CBBPs and selected breeders in new target villages, (2) Fully certified breeding sires to support the business model of CBBPs (links to Health and LLAFS), (3) Fertility improvement package to enhance sheep and goat reproduction For efficient delivery on the three areas and overall implementation of CBBP, establishment of breeders’ cooperatives has been identified as the institutional set up followed for implementation and sustainability of the scheme. This report highlights the performance of the sheep breeders' cooperatives in three sites, namely Bonga, Doyogena and Menz.