aistand south~ern afrkca - (PDF, 101 mb) - USAID

years. Apart from the delays in goat multiplication,
there were no significant failures.
Evaluation of the SR-CRSP
programme
Ecological suitability of livestock und
forage species under study
The DPGs appeared to be well adapted to
conditions in western Kenya especially those
that were born there. Mature goats hrought into
western Kenya from the breeding project in 01
Magogo suffered initial adaptation shocks, that
sometimes resulted in abortions. The shocks
were partly also due to change in management
systems, e.g. goats are tethered in western
Kenya, a departure from the free-range system
at 01 Magogo. In terms of disease hazards,
helminths were generally more of a threat for
DPGs than for the local goats. This was because
it was wetter in western Kenya than in 01
Magogo where the DPGs were raised before
being translocated.
Forage species developed in western
Kenya
Several forage species were screened and their
production technologies developed for DPGs in
viestern Kenya. These included Bana grass
(Pennisetum purpureum derivative), Leucaena,
Sesbaniaand dual-purpose crops that produced
both foods and feeds. Also included was a maize
cultivar (the Maseno Double Cobber), several
high yielding sweet potato cultivars and suitable
technologies for feed conservation such as hay
and silage and the improved utilisation of a wide
range of crop residues. A feed package was also
developed by combining a wide range of milled
crop residues, leaves of high protein multipurpose
tree legumes (especially Sesbania and
Leucaena), molasses, phosphorus and nonprotein
nitrogen (NPN) sources. As western
Kenya falls into three ecozones, humid, subhamid
and semi-arid around the shores of Lake
Victoria, forages grown in the first two ecozones
have very high moisture contents (80%).
Therefore, the dry-matter (DM) intake is limited
although the animals feed to capacity. Studies
have shown that the wilting of forages for a few
hours before feeding increased liveweight gains
(Semenye et al, 1987), therefore livestock should
be given some partially dehydrated forages to
improve DM intake,
Target fa.'-mers for technologies generated
The smallholder farmers who were to benefit
from these technologies had several constraints.
These included:
° lack of money and credit facilities to enable
them to explore the potential of the new
technologies as often, technologies developed
for smallholder farmers required cash input
" shortage of land was so severe that many
households devoted all land available to the
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growing of food crops and livestock was
tethered only on roadsides
the farmers were very careful not to
experiment with certain new forage technologies
for fear that the yields of their food
crops could be adversely affected. This was
particularly pertinent in experiments where
forage crops were intercropped with food
crops (Orim et al, 1985).
However, most DPG farmers intelligently
selected technologies that would suit their needs.
These included:
* almost 100% acceptance of the DPGs
• the DPG farmers generally followed the
recoir mended management of the goats, e.g.
clean milking procedures, proper feeding and
breeding does only to the proven DPG bucks
* almost 100% adoption rate 1br the high
yielding Maseno Double Cobber maize
* the bulk of respondent farmers brought their
goats as well as their cattle for dipping every
week. In contrast, when a nominal fee was
charged to cover the cost of the antihelminthics
and other veterinary care facilities,
most fermers ceased to report cases of
sick goats.
Observations have shown that target farmers
are extremely enterprising, e.g. they have
diverted a lot of the imbued forage technologies
to benefit not only their goats, but also their
cattle. Hence, recent surveys on livestock
numbers in the study areas indicate increases in
the cattle population.
Productivity gap between on-station and
on-farm
Some parameters of productivity gaps between
on-station and on-farm are presented in Figures
1 and 2 for milk production and growth rates,
respectively. Figure 1 indicates that GPGs onfarm
reached their milk peak after one week of
kidding, producing 600 ml daily for household
use. On-station the DPG does reached their peak
milk production, three weeks after kidding, producing
1500 ml per day after the kid had suckled.
This shows a productivity gap of 900 ml between
the two test groups which translates to 150%.
The local does at the station peaked after six
weeks of kidding, representing a daily milk
production of 400 ml. Milk production of local
goats was not measured on-farm since not all
DPG respondent farmers had local goats and
those that had did not milk them because oftheir
low milk yields.
The data presented in Table 1 give the major
differences in production inputs for the DPGs
between on-station and on-farm. The large
performance gaps of DPGs observed between
on-station and on-farm are mainly due to
differences in resource availability.
Growth rates of kids up to three months both
on-station and on-farm are presented in