P7: Evaluation of the feeding value, tannin deactivation, anti-parasitic effects and methane emission reduction potential of selected browse and/or herbaceous legume species fed to sheep/goats in Ethiopia

Description

Decreasing availability and quality of feed has been a major challenge affecting livestock production and productivity in many sub-Saharan African countries. The key challenge will be how to attain improvements in productivity when the feed resource base is poor quality crop residues and low-quality natural pastures. Moreover, there is substantial loss of energy in the form of enteric methane emission when animals depend on crop residues and other poor-quality roughage-based diets resulting in reduced efficiency of feed utilization, poor animal performance and higher greenhouse gas emission per unit of product. Ensuring balanced supply of nutrients and enhancing efficiency of utilization of the available feed resources would be very crucial to make the best and most effective use of the available feeds and to supply the necessary nutrients that allow animals to express their genetic potential for growth, development, and production (Tedeschi and Muir, 2015). There are some herbaceous and tree legume species that could be used as potential supplementary feed to ruminants during the dry season. But the utilization of some of these legume species is constrained by the presence of secondary plant metabolites such as tannins that could have anti-nutrition effects depending upon their nature and concentration while some types of tannins at low or moderate levels could have beneficial effects. Thus, there is a need to undertake nutritional studies to address issues such as climate smart feed production practices, enhancing utilization of available feed resources, overcoming the anti-nutritional properties and exploiting the beneficial roles (reduction of methane production, improving nitrogen utilization and anti-parasitic effects) of secondary plant compounds in some leguminous forages and multipurpose fodder trees though identification of suitable species and varieties and use of appropriate treatment mechanisms (Thornton, 2010).

The research objectives are: (i) To screen potential browse and herbaceous legume species based on chemical composition and in-vitro studies with and without deactivation of tannin content, (ii) To evaluate the effect of supplementation with selected high potential browse or herbaceous legume species on efficiency of feed utilization and animal performance, (iii) To evaluate the effect of supplementation with selected browse and/or herbaceous legume species on enteric greenhouse gas emission, (iv) To evaluate the effect of supplementation with selected high potential browse or herbaceous legume species on parasite load and animal health, (v) The forage species will be evaluated on different species or breeds of animals to see the effects of nutrition and genetics interaction, (vi) To share knowledge and practices in the research on the subject of animal nutrition and environment with relevant stakeholders through appropriate forums.

Involved persons

• Prof. Dr. Adugna Tolera Yadeta
• Sisay Belete Asefa

Involved institutions

• School of Animal and Range Sciences, College of Agriculture

Sponsors

Supported by the DAAD program Bilateral SDG Graduate Schools, funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)