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The objective of this review paper is to examine whether or not sheep crossbreeding is a feasible option to improve indigenous sheep breeds in developing countries using Ethiopian case as example. The paper reviewed and discussed the history of exotic breed introduction, research, and development efforts in crossbreeding and performance of crossbreds under on-station and on-farm management. Earlier, the choice of breed for crossbreeding overlooked interests and preferences of farmers mainly for physical appearance. More recently the introduction of Awassi sheep considered their preference. Performance evaluation results from the on-station and on-farm (mainly based on Awassi pilot crossbreeding villages) showed that crossbreds often outperformed their local contemporaries. Thus comparisons of pure local sheep and crossbreds among those breeds produced in some areas indicated a good outcome of this type of crossbreeding. However, the performance of crossbred sheep varied by location and depended on management and exotic inheritance levels. For most programs, no comprehensive data were available to do on-farm comparisons of herd productivity and cost-benefits or to evaluate the sustainability of the programs. Regardless of location, farmers participating in crossbreeding often showed keen interest in crossbreeding, mainly due to the fast growth, larger body size of crossbreds resulting in higher market prices as compared to their local sheep breeds. Ram multiplication and dissemination from the government farms were found inefficient. The predominant practice of a ubiquitous dissemination and selling of breeding rams to individual farmer dilute the efforts of crossbreeding and prevents generating the benefits expected from crossbreeding programs. Furthermore, indiscriminate crossbreeding without prior analysis of suitability of crossbreds for a given production environment and without clear breeding objectives presents a potential threat to better adapted indigenous breeds. Crossbreeding programs require strong research and development support from public service and non-governmental institutions for sustainable design, optimization, and implementation in clearly defined production environments.

The SmaRT pack project is the implementation of integrated approaches of small ruminant production and productivity improvement technologies of breeds through community-based breeding improvement, feed & nutrition, animal health, collective marketing, and environmental sustainability in Ethiopia. Part of the Livestock CRP operating in Menz,Bonga, Abergela and Doyogena. In the framework of this project, the Alliance of Biodiversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and the International Center for Agriculture Research in the Dry Areas, (ICARDA), together with their partners, are jointly working on Comprehensive Livestock Environmental Assessment for Improved Nutrition, a Secured Environment and Sustainable Development (CLEANED) of the Small Ruminant value chain, in Menz, Bonga, Doyogena and Abergele, in Ethiopia. This report presents the discussions and outputs of the virtual CLEANED internal expert validation workshop that took place on Teams 25th June 2021. Due to the political unrest and COVID-19 situation in Ethiopia, this was an internal validation workshop. Together with experts from CIAT, the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and ICARDA.The workshop aimed to validate the environmental impacts quantified by CLEANED for small ruminant systems in Ethiopia. CLEANED runs were carried out for Menz, Bonga, Doyogena and Abergele with key input data including farm inputs, herd composition and animal whereabouts. Based on these data, the model quantifies land use and water requirements, nutrient balances and greenhouse gas emissions (GHGe). This is a first step in understanding environmental trade-offs in the modeled systems and forms the basis for designing systems with a reduced environmental footprint and that enhance ecosystem services.

Background Understanding the relationship between genetic admixture and performances is crucial for the success of crossbreeding programs. Use of small sets of ancestry informative markers (AIMs) is a cost effective option to estimate the levels of admixture in situations where pedigree recording is difficult. In this study we select AIMs from Ovine 50KSNP data (SNP – single nucleotide polymorphism) and validate their ability in estimating the contributions of parental breeds to get information about optimum admixture levels for smallholders. Results We estimated admixture levels using ADMIXTURE software based on 74 AIMs selected from Ovine 50KSNP data. Awassi x Ethiopian fat-tailed crossbred sheep populations kept in government farms and farmer villages in different districts were included in the study. Mean Awassi levels estimated based on the selected AIMs were close to the Awassi levels obtained from pedigree information. Estimates from the 74 SNPs were compared to subsets of 65, 55, 45, 35, 25 and 15 SNPs selected based on both top and bottom fixation index (FST) rank using Spearman's rank correlation (r = 0.862–0.996). A t-test comparison revealed that all SNP subsets had produced similar (P > 0.05) estimates with the 74 SNPs, except for the bottom 15 SNPs (P < 0.05). However estimates based on 45 and above SNP subsets were relatively close to the fitted regression line (r = 0.969–0.996). Association of admixture levels with lamb growth showed that Awassi level affected (P < 0.05) eight months weight in both farmer locations, lambs with higher Awassi levels were heavier. Lambing interval of ewes was longer as Awassi level increased, but this drawback was outweighed by the increased productivity of ewes in terms of eight months lamb weight per year. Conclusions The results indicate that the Ovine 50KSNP array is a powerful tool to identify small sets of AIMs for admixture studies. The results of this study reveal about 45AIMs to accurately estimate admixture levels. If admixture estimation service with such low cost SNP chip would be available, farmers would have a clear market advantage without the need to rely on incomplete or possibly inaccurate pedigree records. Based on the results presented here, we were able to suggest optimum levels of breed composition for the two farmer environments investigated.

Breeding programmes described as community-based (CBBP) typically relate to low-input systems with farmers having a common interest to improve and share their genetic resources. CBBPs are more frequent with keepers of small ruminants, in particular smallholders of local breeds, than with cattle, pigs or chickens with which farmers may have easier access to alternative programmes. Constraints that limit the adoption of conventional breeding technologies in low-input systems cover a range of organizational and technical aspects. The analysis of 8 CBBPs located in countries of Latin-America, Africa and Asia highlights the importance of bottom-up approaches and involvement of local institutions in the planning and implementation stages. The analysis also reveals a high dependence of these programmes on organizational, technical and financial support. Completely self-sustained CBBPs seem to be difficult to realize. There is a need to implement and document formal socio-economic evaluations of CBBPs to provide governments and other development agencies with the information necessary for creating sustainable CBBPs at larger scales.

Community-based livestock breeding programmes (CBBPs) have emerged as a potential approach to implement sustainable livestock breeding in smallholder systems. In Malawi and Uganda, goat CBBPs were introduced to improve production and productivity of indigenous goats through selective breeding. Scaling up CBBPs have recently received support due to evidence-based results from current implementation and results of CBBPs implemented in other regions of the world. This paper explores strategies for scaling up goat CBBPs in Malawi and Uganda, and documents experiences and lessons learned during implementation of the programme. A number of stakeholders supporting goat-based interventions for improving smallholders' livelihoods exists. This offers an opportunity for different actors to work together by pooling financial resources and technical expertise for establishment and sustainability of goat CBBPs. Scaling up strategies should be an integral part of the pilot design hence dissemination partners need to be engaged during the design and inception stages of the pilot CBBPs. Creation of self-sustaining CBBPs requires early collaborative programme planning, meaningful investment and long-term concerted and coordinated efforts by collaborating partners. Permanently established actors, like government agencies and research and training institutions, are better placed to coordinate such efforts. The overall goal of the scaling up programme should be creation of a financially sustainable system, in which smallholders are able, on their own, to transact and sustain operations of their local breeding institutions using locally generated revenue/ resources. Since CBBP scaling up is a 'learning by doing process', an effective monitoring and evaluation system should be an integral part of the process.

This roadmap is developed based on a context analysis of Ethiopian agriculture. The roadmap aims to strengthen the role of the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) in addressing vulnerabilities facing the agriculture sector under changing climatic conditions by institutionalizing climate-smart agriculture. The roadmap is largely informed by the overarching country Climate Resilient Green Economy (CRGE) strategy; review of scientific literature; sectoral documents on Ethiopian agriculture and climate-smart agriculture; and related reports from government, development partners, scientific publications, expert comments on the draft and inputs obtained from several senior experts on two presentations made during climate-smart agriculture platform meetings conducted in May and November 2019.