Possibilities of utilizing biotechnology to improve Animal and animal feeds productivity in Tanzania – Review of past efforts and available opportunities

Journal Article

Tanzania ranks third in Africa in numbers of livestock and has a rich biodiversity of 25.8milion heads of cattle, about 25million heads of small ruminants (sheep and goats) and a large number of other livestock species. The majority of livestock species are indigenous animals with low productive potential. In addition, the farming systems are still to a large extent traditional utilizing local feeds which have very low quality. Due to these reasons the contribution of livestock sector to the gross domestic product has been very low estimated between 4.7 and 5%. There have been attempts to improve productivity from livestock and livestock feeds in the past through different research and development projects. However most of these projects were not sustainable and most of them did not bear good fruits while some were abandoned. Biotechnology offers options for improvement of the livestock sector by manipulating both livestock species and management systems such as the environment and feeds. However, there is a very low rate of investment in biotechnology especially in livestock and feeds production. In this paper we review, the efforts intended at improvement of livestock genetics and animal nutrition and we discuss the options and opportunities for improvement of the livestock sector using modern technologies. Examples of these efforts include the breeding of Mpwapwa cattle, Malya blended goats and improvements of various breeds of other livestock species and poultry. We showcase these possibilities using three studies conducted recently in Tanzania, including: (1) characterization of the indigenous stock of cattle to develop breeding plans, (2) identification of pathogens in raw milk in the informal markets of Tanzania, and (3) expression of the prion protein gene for resistance to bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE).