Africa: Well adapted livestock key to sustainable productivity

The genetically diverse and "exquisitely well adapted" traits of Africa's livestock should be better harnessed to meet the continent's needs. Seventy per cent of Africa's rural poor keep livestock and 200 million people depend on the animals for their livelihoods. African livestock breeds have successfully survived, and adapted to, an extraordinary range of diseases and climate changes. But they are currently being displaced by "exotic" breeds imported from the developed world.