Traditional farmers’ pig trait preferences and awareness levels toward reproductive biotechnology application in Zambia

Abstract

Objective: This study assessed traditional farmers’ preferences for indigenous pigs and their awareness levels toward reproductive biotechnology. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional, descriptive study employed a mixed-methods con¬current triangulation design with a pragmatic approach. For quantitative data collection, a ran¬domly selected sample size of 622 respondents was interviewed using a structured questionnaire. A semi-structured interview guide was used in seven focus group discussions (FGDs) for qualitative data. For quantitative data, descriptive statistics were used to find out how often something happened, and chi-square tests were used to look for relationships. For qualitative data, thematic analysis was used. Results: The majority (66.9%) of respondents were female, and they had largely (64.8%) attended a primary level of education. A slight majority (43.1%) of the respondents were 30–45 years old. Most respondents (65.1%) were low-income earners (below K500). Incidentally, the majority (74.1%) of respondents had low awareness of reproductive biotechnologies. Respondents’ aware¬ness levels were associated with gender (p < 0.001), education (p < 0.001), income (p < 0.01), and not age (p > 0.05). With regard to trait preference, a total of seven indigenous pig traits were reportedly preferred, of which disease resistance (25.9%) and litter size (23.8%) were the most preferred. From FGDs, participants valued indigenous pigs, citing many preferred traits, of which disease resistance and litter size were the most emphasized traits. Some participants were aware of many reproductive biotechnologies and their perceived advantages. However, they were more familiar with artificial insemination, heat detection methods, and synchronization. Conclusions: The majority of respondents had low awareness of reproductive biotechnologies. Respondents’ awareness was associated with sociodemographic characteristics. The identified indigenous pig traits preferred by traditional farmers included adaptive and productive traits.

The Utility of Punyakoti Test for Pregnancy Detection in Artificially Inseminated Dairy Cattle: The Case of Smallholder Farming in Zambia

“…To date, there are limited reports of its application in the Sub-Saharan Africa even though it originated from the ancient Egypt (Bethapudi et al, 2015). This could be attributed to a lack of awareness of this technique and any other pregnancy detection techniques as is the case with other livestock farmers (Abigaba et al, 2022). The current higher mean germination and shoot length of maize seeds cultured in DW than that placed in urine-water solutions agreed with previous studies that used maize seeds (Okunlola et al, 2019) and other cereal seeds like wheat seeds (Rine et al, 2014;Skálová et al, 2017), and mung beans (Lázničková et al, 2020).…”

“…S mallholder dairy farming contributes towards resilience to food (nutrition) insecurity, and income in rural households (Banda et al, 2021), hence the need to increase production and productivity of dairy cattle. This notwithstanding, the demand for animal protein doesn't match the supply, and is expected to increase consequent to increasing human population (Pandey, 2014;MFL, 2020;Abigaba et al, 2022). Of stark interest, however, is the observation that the full production potential of dairy cattle has not been fully realized.…”

“…There are reports of Punyakoti test application in many countries (Rahman and Saha, 2020) with some of them repeatedly recommending its application in pregnancy detection (Rine et al, 2014;Rahman and Saha, 2020). However, to date, dairy farmers in Zambia have not utilized Punyakoti test probably because, like other livestock farmers, their awareness of pregnancy detection technologies is generally low (Abigaba et al, 2022). In addition, there are currently no reports on Punyakoti test that have been conducted in Zambia.…”