Morphological Characterization of Goat Populations in Central Zone of Tigray, Ethiopia

Ethiopia has huge livestock resource, but poor in their productivity. It stated national small ruminant breeding policy and strategy focused on genetic improvement. This is intended to design appropriate breeding programs based on the indigenous breeds status. Study of phenotypic variation is among the prerequisite activities of genetic improvement that is limited in this study area. The objective of this study was to describe morphological characteristics and variations of goat populations in the Central zone of Tigray. Qualitative and quantitative data of 403 young to matured goats (326 lactating does and 77 bucks) were used to analyze by frequency procedure, GLM procedure, Pearson correlation, and multivariate analysis of SAS version 9.4. The study revealed that goats in Adwa district were distinct in coat colors and pattern, horn shape, ear orientation, head profile and ruff, significantly heavier (p<0.01) and larger (p<0.001) in height at withers and in height at pelvic than those in Tanqua Abergele (TA) and Kola Tembien (KT) districts. Goats found in Adwa district were morphologically distinct from those found in TA and KT districts with the higher discriminating values in female goats

Participatory definition of trait preferences for designing village breeding schemes for goats in harsh environments of Ethiopia

There is critical need to improve productivity of indigenous goat breeds in order to sustain supply of food and income to communities living in harsher areas that are coming to relay more and more on the drought tolerant commodity; goats, due to changing climate. To this end, a community-based goat breeding project is being implemented in 5 zones of Ethiopia by ILRI and its partners. Designing of the breeding programs proceeded phenotypic and molecular characterization of the indigenous Ethiopian goat breeds. The characterization studies revealed that ample genetic diversity exists between and within the indigenous goat breeds pointing hug potential to tap for improving productivity amid a changing climate. Participatory definition of trait preferences was undertaken to pave the way for deriving economic weights of traits to develop selection indices

LIVES poultry value chain development interventions: Approaches and scalable interventions

Global Affairs Canad

Land Use/Land Cover Factor Values and Accuracy Assessment Using a GIS and Remote Sensing in the Case of the Quashay Watershed in Northwestern Ethiopia

Soil erosion by water is a complex process influenced by different factors. Most of these factors are steady over time, but land use/cover and land management practices are gradually altering. Analyzing land use/cover type and C-factor mapping using a Geographic Information System and Remote Sensing is the simplest way to identify vegetation coverage. GIS is a tool that is invaluable for conducting image classification through modeling. The present study was conducted in the Quashay watershed, Burie District, Ethiopia. The objectives of the study were to conduct land use/cover classification, to verify land use/cover factor values derived from LANDSAT images with actual identified types with respect to given values in Ethiopia from the literature. The remote sensing data used was from the LANDSAT 8 Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) sensor, and were taken in 2017 for land use/cover mapping. Data were gathered through field observation and classification of land use/land cover type into homogenous land units. The inputs for the C-factor values were collected from literature review and in the field. Four land use/cover types were identified. The C-factor value of the study area ranged between 0.01 and 0.17. The overall accuracy of the image classification was 83.72 % and the Kappa coefficient was 0.7823. This means there was 78.23 % agreement for the classified image by chance alone. Therefore, this raster layer can be used as one input for soil loss analysis. It is concluded that analysis of LANDSAT images with accuracy assessment gives due attention for land resource managers to give priority to poor land cover areas with appropriate management plans. We recommend that, before assigning C-factor values to a classified image, accuracy assessment should be carried out and the computed C-factor raster layer of this study can be used as an input for soil loss estimation using GIS and RS

Polymorphism analysis of kisspeptin (KISS1) gene and its association with litter size in Ethiopian indigenous goat populations

Polymorphism analysis of the Kisspeptin (KISS1) gene and its association with litter size were conducted in two (Gondar and Woyto Guji) Ethiopian indigenous goat populations. Three new pairs of primers were designed for touchdown PCR condition. A total of 173 and 242 Sanger sequences were employed for further analysis of exon1 (1210 bp) and exon2 (325 bp) regions of the KISS1 gene, respectively. In addition, the identified polymorphic sites were associated with litter size of the animals included in the study. General linear model was carried out for the association analysis. The study revealed that five complete substitutions and 15 polymorphic sites were detected in both exon regions with 2:1 transition and transversion ratio. Most of the polymorphic sites were observed in more than 1% of the sequences qualifying the single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) definition. The overall average codon bias index was 0.301 with 64.09 and 62.47% GC contents in exon1 and exon2, respectively. The overall average HE was 0.18863±0.21 for exon1 and 0.03155±0.01. Only four loci, which constitute 10 genotypes, from the polymorphic sites showed significant contribution of litter size of the goat populations studied. Heterozygous genotypes (TC and GC at g.950T>C and g.3416G>C, respectively) had performed highest estimates of litter size in three of the loci which contributed for litter size. However, the homozygous genotype observed at locus g.3811C>T showed highest contribution for fecundity trait. 18 to 31% performance differences of litter size were observed due to the influence of the genotypes. In conclusion, the SNP detected in those target regions of the gene confirm the contribution of the KISS1 gene for fecundity trait suggesting importance of the gene for marker assisted selection in goat breeding programs