Grasslands of the World.pdf - Disasters and Conflicts - UNEP

Grassland perspectives 481
to sown pasture, as are Mongolia and Tibet . The Campos , which is relatively
well watered, has developed sown pastures using both summer - and winter -
growing species, and sown pasture is important in the Pampas . In central
North America , sown pasture, often in rotation with crops, plays an important
role in livestock production. It is, of course, very important in other areas of
North America, Western Europe and, notably, New Zealand.
Sown pasture is widely used in the better-watered parts of Australia ,
especially in the Mediterranean and temperate parts, although also used in
the tropics. In areas of Mediterranean climate, self-reseeding annual forages
are widely used in rotation with annual crops , most of the forages used
are of Mediterranean origin, and the system is very similar to the ancient
cereal-grazed-fallow rotation of that zone, except that, after initial seeding
and establishment, fertilizer and grazing management is aimed at allowing
the annuals to seed and regenerate: the area under annual rotational pastures
(“leys” locally) is declining as rotation of cereals with other annual cash crops,
including pulses, becomes more profitable. Much work has been carried out
on tropical pastures, and these are of some importance, but there is need for
legumes better adapted to grazing since Stylosanthes spp., once a mainstay of
sown and improved tropical pastures, were seen to be susceptible to attack by
Colletotrichum spp. in the 1980s. Pasture improvement through over-seeding
is also important. Sown pasture was not important on the Russian steppe
during the period immediately prior to decollectivization, but the authors of
Chapter 10 argue that it should become so.
Sown fodder
Fodder in this context is forages grown as whole-crop feed for livestock,
whether fed green or conserved. Such crops are often used to supplement
grazing or for fattening or dairy production in many systems . Fodder is little
used in the traditional pastoral systems of sub-Saharan Africa, but is becoming
increasingly used in agropastoral and crop producing areas as available free
grazing disappears. In eastern and southern Africa, fodders were widely grown
on large-scale dairy farms (Plate 12.6), but changes in farm size and farming
systems have led to a great reduction in the range of fodders now grown;
Pennisetum purpureum is widely used for cut-and-carry feeding by smallholders
(Plates 12.7 and 12.8). Commercial grazing systems in South Africa use some
fodder, including some for “exceptional circumstances ”, but most others require
irrigation, which can usually be used more profitably for other crops. Some fodder
is grown in North Africa , a little irrigated alfalfa and, more important, oats
for hay , which is often produced for sale to herders from drier areas (Chaouki
et al., 2004). Little fodder is grown in the desert grazing lands of the Near East.
Egypt is unusual in North Africa as nearly all its livestock are stall fed, and cultivated
fodder is important to supplement crop residues – the production system
is very similar to that of the irrigated tracts of Punjab, and Alexandrian clover,