Understanding farmers’ preference for traits of chickens in rural Ethiopia

Abstract

Traditional poultry production plays an irreplaceable role in the sustenance of livelihoods in rural Ethiopia. Ironically, however, much has been done to replace indigenous poultry breeds with exotic genetic resources regardless of the importance producers and consumers attach to attributes of the resources. This study aims at informing policy to establish effective indigenous poultry breeding and conservation programs. Discrete choice experiment (DCE) was employed to generate data. Designing of the DCE involved identification, definition, and measurement of attributes of adaptive, productive, and sociocultural importance considering the multiple functions of village chickens. Random parameters logit and the generalized multinomial logit (G-MNL) models were used to estimate taste parameters. Economic values of traits of chickens were estimated using the utility in willingness-to-pay (WTP) space approach, based on G-MNL model formulation. The results show that important traits of chickens to farmers are mothering ability, diseases resistance, and meat and eggs taste. These findings question the appropriateness, at least in the prevailing production system, of the Ethiopian national government's effort to improve productivity in village poultry by targeting specialized egg-layer improved chickens. The findings also suggest that poultry breeding programs aiming to provide readily acceptable breed technology by farmers need to prioritize traits of adaptive importance, and mothering ability, instead of focusing on egg productivity only. The key implication is that the unique qualities of the indigenous poultry breeds need to be carefully identified and prioritized before resorting to those that proved to be successful in different production systems.

The productivity of 4th Generation KUB-2 Chicken

“…Recently Ethiopian government exported exotic breed to improve their local chicken (Terfa et al 2019). This program might have been based on the report of (Wondmeneh et al 2016) who compared egg production between Horro improve breed of local chicken with modern commercial ISA Brown, crossbred of ISA Brown X Horro, and indigenous Ethiopian breed of chicken, showed that egg production recorded for 24 weeks of those evaluated breeds, were respectively 57,1% HH; 92,2% HH; 83% HH dan 27,1%.…”

“…The improvement of the breed through selection is time-consuming which is resulting in more permanent product quality (Padhi 2016), whilst crossbreeding may increase productivity quickly, but it will deplete its original genetic resources very fast (Dessie et al 2011). Some developing countries like Ethiopia (Mengesha 2012;Hailu et al 2014;Gebremariam et al 2017;Terfa et al 2019), Kenya (Magothe et al 2015;Kamau et al 2019), Nigeria (Nwogwugwu et al 2018), Ghana (Osei-Amponsah et al 2015), India (Haunshi et al 2019), and Thailand (Suphawadee & Tuan 2016), have increased their local breeds of chicken either through selection or crossbreeding. Eventually in Indonesia, the work of improvement of local chicken breeds has been initiated as well (Sartika et al 2013;Iskandar & Sartika 2014).…”

Performans Produktivitas Ayam KUB-2 Fase Produksi Telur pada Generasi ke-4

“…Perbaikan genetik dengan cara seleksi walaupun lama namun dapat menghasilkan kualitas produksi yang permanen (Padhi 2016), sedangkan perbaikan genetik dengan crossbreeding sangat cepat meningkatkan produktivitas namun seringkali menguras sumberdaya genetik aslinya (Dessie et al 2011). Beberapa negara berkembang di Afrika dan Asia telah melakukan peningkatan produktivitas ayam lokal baik melalui seleksi maupun crossbreeding seperti di Ethiopia (Mengesha 2012;Hailu et al 2014;Gebremariam et al 2017;Terfa et al 2019), di Kenya (Magothe et al 2015;Kamau et al 2019), di Nigeria (Nwogwugwu et al 2018), di Ghana (Amponsah et al 2015), di India (Haunshi et al 2019), di Thailand (Suphawadee & Tuan 2016) dan Indonesia (Sartika et al 2013;Iskandar & Sartika 2014).…”

“…Milkias et al (2019) pada ayam lokal Ethiopia di Distrik Gena Bossa pada berbagai agroekosistem dataran rendah, sedang dan tinggi dengan pemeliharaan tradisional mendapatkan hasil produksi telur yang sangat rendah dibandingkan dengan penelitian ini yaitu 38,73; 40,45; 36,42 butir/ekor/tahun. Untuk meningkatkan produksi telur di Ethiopia, pemerintahnya mendatangkan breed exotic, untuk disilangkan dengan ayam lokal di Ethiopia (Terfa et al 2019). Hal tersebut telah dilakukan Wondmeneh et al (2016) yang melakukan evaluasi produksi telur improve breed ayam Horro, komersial breed ayam ISA Brown, crossbred (ISA Brown X Horro) dan ayam lokal asli Ethiopia mendapatkan produksi telur hen house selama 6 bulan untuk masing-masing breed tersebut sebesar 57,1%; 92,2%; 83% dan 27,1%.…”

Morphometric measurements and carcass characteristics of Black Australorp, Naked Neck, and Rhode Island Red crossbreds under alternative production systems

“…Native chicken breeds in traditional extensive production systems are integral part of the poultry production in developing countries (Ghayas et al, 2020). These chickens are famous for better adaptability to the local environment (Batool et al, 2018) and their perpetuate role in breaking the vicious cycles of nutritional scarcities in developing countries (Terfa et al, 2019). However, due to unplanned and haphazard crossing in village farming systems, the traits of economic importance in these birds are not feasible for enough profit generation.…”