The livestock roles in the wellbeing of rural communities of Timor-Leste

The livestock species play very important economic and socio-cultural roles for the wellbeing of rural households, such as food supply, source of income, asset saving, source of employment, soil fertility, livelihoods, transport, agricultural traction, agricultural diversification and sustainable agricultural production. The aim of this work was to identify and characterize the different roles that livestock and livestock species play in rural communities of Timor-Leste, highlighting the importance of animal production for the wellbeing and rural development, and relate the functions performed by livestock production with economic, social and cultural attributes of the communities. The data used in this study were collected in 2011 through a questionnaire survey in three rural communities in the district of Bobonaro, namely in a mountain area, an irrigation plain and a coastal zone, and were complemented with secondary data. Livestock production in Timor-Leste is predominantly familiar being chickens, pigs, goats, cattle, horses, buffaloes and sheep the main species. Beyond the economic function, each livestock species also performs social and cultural functions

Fertility rates following the transfer of ovine embryos cryopreserved using three protocols

The aim of this study was to compare the efficiency of three cryopreservation techniques namely, controlled slow freezing, conventional vitrification and open pulled straw (OPS) vitrification, for the cryopreservation of in vivo produced Portuguese Black Merino ovine embryos. Fresh (control group) and cryopreserved embryos (3 methods) were transferred by laparoscopy to recipient ewes (2 embryos/recipient). Embryo survival rates were assessed and pregnancy diagnosis was performed by serum progesterone concentration on day 18 and by ultrasonography on day 45, and at lambing. Successful pregnancy and embryo survival rates did not differ between the fresh (73.3 and 50.0%, respectively) and cryopreserved (58.3 and 38.5%, respectively) embryos. No differences in lambing and embryo survival rates were observed between the three cryopreservation methods used (68.4 and 44.7%; 50.0 and 33.3%; 54.5 and 36.3% for controlled slow freezing, vitrification and OPS, respectively). Pregnancy rate based on serum progesterone concentration on day 18 was higher than the pregnancy diagnosed at 45 days following transfer for the cryopreserved embryos. It could be concluded that all three cryopreservation techniques were equally efficient in preserving and propagating genetic material in Portuguese Black Merino sheep