Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) and the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) are working together to develop forages to improve the genetic potential of livestock animals in sub-Saharan Africa and in the long term reduce the levels of greenhouse gases (GHGs) emitted by them.
The project, commissioned by the UK-CGIAR Centre and funded by the UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), has just completed its proof-of-concept phase. The teams have been working in Ethiopia and Scotland with plans to expand the work in Ethiopia over the next year.
Livestock, GHG emissions and forages
Livestock is a rapidly growing sub-sector of agriculture, especially in Africa. Around 85% of livestock farmers in the world reside in the sub-Saharan part of the continent. Livestock industries contribute around 35% to the region’s Agricultural Gross Domestic Products. However, the sub-sector is ill-equipped to meet the demands for dairy products, which are predicted to increase significantly in the coming decades.
Livestock farming is also linked to GHG emissions. Ruminants like cows, sheep, and goats emit significant levels of methane – a potent GHG responsible for about 30% of global warming – as a byproduct of their digestion cycles. In addition to the environmental impacts, methane emissions can cause ruminants to lose dietary energy, potentially impacting both the animal’s health and productivity. For various reasons, farmers in sub-Saharan Africa often lack access to sufficient supplies of high-quality, affordable feeds – especially during the dry season – and so most cattle are often fed low-quality crop residues and forages. The amount of methane produced and emitted by animals depends on the type of feed that is fed to them, with some species and varieties leading to greater amounts of methane emissions than others.
The goal of the project is to create the techniques and knowledge needed to develop higher quality forages and food/feed crops, with low methane traits, to feed livestock in sub-Saharan Africa. Farmers keeping fewer, but more productive, animals will not only reduce the GHG emissions levels from farms but also increase production and the profitability of livestock by reducing costs of feed relative to farmers’ incomes.
The SRUC-ILRI partnership
ILRI has a rich history in ruminant nutrition and its labs contain impressive genetic resources of forages and food/feed crops. The organisation’s genebank in Addis Ababa holds nearly 20,000 forage accessions and is the most diverse collection in terms of the types of species stored. SRUC has renowned expertise in rumen microbiology and has advanced high-throughput screening capabilities in its labs. Yet while SRUC and ILRI have a history of research collaboration, this project is the first formal partnership between the two in ruminant nutrition.
“In the past, scientists at SRUC and ILRI have had numerous discussions about collaborating on a project of this nature, but there was no real way of taking things further,” said Professor Jamie Newbold of SRUC, one of the project leads.
He continued “The creation of this project through the UK-CGIAR Centre has really given the research the kickstart it needs, and we now have a formal partnership in place between ILRI and SRUC.”
So far, the partnership has enabled the project teams to harness the cutting-edge scientific research capabilities and expertise of both institutes. As part of the work, 758 oven-dried and ground samples of Napier grass (Cenchrus purpureus) – a popular “fodder crop” for livestock in tropical and subtropical regions – were collected from a diverse set of 84 accessions obtained from ILRI’s genebank. After being grown, they were evaluated under two seasons (wet and dry) for a range of feed quality traits.
The grass samples, along with detailed phenotype information, were then shipped to SRUC labs in Edinburgh, Scotland, to develop high-throughput in vitro screens. Materials were then ranked based on methane emissions.
The work has helped the teams to develop a new in vitro techniqueto screen forage and crop by-product materials based on rumen characteristics. This development will allow the project teams to understand which types of forage produce the lowest levels of methane when digested by ruminants.
An ILRI researcher took part in a staff exchange programme and undertook training at SRUC with the aim of establishing the technique in sub-Saharan Africa. This may help teams to utilise the technique to support plant breeders’ work on improving other types of forages and crop by-products in the region.
Looking forward
The partners have successfully secured funding to continue the work into its second year. The Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) will join the research consortium as one of the national partners to help take the work forward.
Reflecting on the first year of the project, Dr Chris Jones of ILRI said:
“The staff exchanges and visits have really helped us to better understand the challenges faced on the ground and the resources available within the partnership. We’re now integrating EIAR into the project as a research partner to strengthen our work on the ground in sub-Saharan Africa.”
Over the next year, the partners plan to select more forages and food/feed crops for further studies, which will help them to verify the effect of different materials on rumen function. The plan is to then start animal trials to confirm which varieties produce the lowest methane levels in ruminants.
Main image credit: The Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT.