Employment and incomes - Why Livestock Matter

photo credit: ILRI/Stevie Mann

Employment and incomes:

Globally, the livestock sector is as an important source of jobs, providing livelihoods and incomes for at least 1.3 billion people. Livestock keeping is one of very few livelihood options in challenging settings such as drylands: Nearly 200 million pastoralists produce food and generate incomes where crop farming is limited, risky or impossible.

Investment options

The livestock sector should be integrated into national rural development policies and programs. It has growing potential to create employment for youth and women, not only in livestock keeping but also in processing livestock products, in producing and selling livestock feeds and in providing livestock information services.

Sustainable development policies in dryland settings should balance the goals of improved livelihoods of livestock keepers and environmental conservation. While policies should account for the fragility of many pastoral environments, and support sustainable livestock keeping, they should also help diversify enterprises beyond livestock. New public-private partnerships should also be supported to provide veterinary services in remote pastoral settings.

Key references

De Haan, C., Dubern, E., Garancher, B., and Quintero, C. 2016. Pastoralism development in the Sahel: A road to stability. Washington, DC: World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/24228

FAO. 2009. The State of Food and Agriculture: Livestock in the Balance. Rome: FAO. http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i0680e/i0680e.pdf

Herrero, M. 2009. Livestock, livelihoods and the environment: Understanding the trade-offs. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 1(2):111–120. https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2009.10.003

Herrero, M., Di Mayberry, D., van de Steeg, J., Phelan, D., Ash, A., Diyezee, K., Robinson, T., Henderson, B., Gilbert, M., van Wijk, M., Godde, C., Blummel, M., Prestwidge, D., Stephenson, E., Power, B., and Parsons, D. 2016. Understanding livestock yield gaps for poverty alleviation, food security and the environment. The LivesGAPS project - final report. Brisbane: CSIRO. http://hdl.handle.net/10568/93009

Robinson, T.P., Thornton, P.K., Franceschini, G., Kruska, R.L., Chiozza, F., Notenbaert, A., Cecchi, G., Herrero, M., Epprecht, M., Fritz, W., You, L., Conchedda, G., and See, L. 2011. Global Livestock Production Systems. Rome: FAO and Nairobi: ILRI. http://hdl.handle.net/10568/10537

Thorne, P.J. and Conroy, C. 2017. Research on livestock, livelihoods and innovation. IN: Snapp, S. and Pound, B. 2017. Agricultural Systems: Agroecology and Rural Innovation for Development. London: Academic Press: 303–329. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-802070-8.00009-8

Thornton, P.K. 2010. Livestock production: recent trends, future prospects. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 365:2853–2867. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2010.0134

Thornton, P.K.; Kruska, R.L.; Henninger, N.; Kristjanson, P.M.; Reid, R.S.; Atieno, F.; Odero, A.N.; Ndegwa, T. 2002. Mapping poverty and livestock in the developing world. Nairobi: ILRI. http://hdl.handle.net/10568/915

World Bank. 2009. Minding the stock: Bringing public policy to bear on livestock policy. Washington DC: World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/3043

World Initiative for Sustainable Pastoralism. 2007. Pastoralism as shrewd managers of risk and resilience in the horn of Africa. WISP Policy Brief 4. Nairobi: IUCN. http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/pastoralists_as_shrewd_managers_of_risk_and_resilience.pdf