Monau P I, Visser C, Nsoso S J, Van Marle-Köster E
Department of Animal and Wildlife Sciences, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, 0002, South Africa.
Department of Animal Science, Botswana University of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Private bag 0027, Gaborone, Botswana.
Trop Anim Health Prod. 2017 Aug;49(6):1265-1271. doi: 10.1007/s11250-017-1324-6. Epub 2017 Jun 17.
A total of 153 communal farmers in four agro-ecological regions of Botswana were interviewed using a structured questionnaire. The aims of the survey were to characterise existing communal goat production systems, evaluate the importance of goats to farmers and identify breeding practices and constraints encountered in goat production in Botswana. Data was collected on socio-economic parameters, general and breeding management practices and major constraints limiting goat production in Botswana. All respondents were small-scale communal farmers with 63% respondents practising mixed crop-livestock farming and 37% keeping livestock as their primary activity. The majority (33%) of respondents were older than 60 years. Over 80% of the farmers kept goats for cash required for tuition, school uniforms and household commodities as well as re-stocking of animals. Most farmers (62%) kept indigenous crossed genotypes. Generally, uncontrolled mating was practised with the majority of farmers (41%) using on-farm reared bucks for more than two years of breeding and communal bucks (36%) as an alternative. The major constraints limiting goat productivity in communal areas included uncontrolled breeding, predators, theft and diseases. Issues raised by farmers should be considered in designing and implementing effective breeding programs for goats to improve their overall productivity and contribution to poverty alleviation in these communities.
在博茨瓦纳四个农业生态区，共对153名社区农民进行了结构化问卷调查。该调查的目的是描述现有的社区山羊生产系统，评估山羊对农民的重要性，并确定博茨瓦纳山羊生产中遇到的繁殖方式和制约因素。收集了有关社会经济参数、一般管理和繁殖管理方式以及限制博茨瓦纳山羊生产的主要制约因素的数据。所有受访者均为小规模社区农民，63%的受访者从事作物-畜牧混合养殖，37%以畜牧作为主要活动。大多数（33%）受访者年龄超过60岁。超过80%的农民饲养山羊是为了获取学费、校服和家庭日用品所需的现金以及用于动物补栏。大多数农民（62%）饲养本地杂交基因型山羊。一般来说，交配不受控制，大多数农民（41%）使用农场饲养的种公羊进行两年以上的配种，还有36%的农民使用社区种公羊作为替代。限制社区山羊生产力的主要制约因素包括繁殖不受控制、天敌、盗窃和疾病。在设计和实施有效的山羊育种计划以提高其整体生产力并促进这些社区减贫时，应考虑农民提出的问题。
