Livestock- and fodder-related research—which has global environmental implications . . .

Rangelands are lands that are covered with natural vegetation, generally on marginal lands, and are used for grazing as the rainfall is too low for sustainable cropping under rainfed conditions. In fact, the prime and historical role of rangelands has been to support livestock production by nomadic pastoralists from Morocco to Mongolia, through all of Central Asia, between the 400 mm and 150 mm rainfall isohyets. The rangeland—also referred to as steppe in the WANA and Central Asia regions—is now under threat from encroaching cultivation and overuse by pastoralists.
     Two important projects on rangeland livestock production in Central Asia, where national economies have been put in severe jeopardy during the transition to free market systems, involve collaboration between ICARDA and the US.
     The Global Livestock Collaborative Research Support Program (GL-CRSP), coordinated by the University of California, Davis, involves scientists from Davis, Utah State University, USDA-ARS and ICARDA. The team is using remote-sensing and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to develop predictive models of rangeland production and management. These models will help international donors, regional decision-makers, and local policy-makers to understand and predict regional trends of rangeland production in Central Asia, including the identification and prevention of major imbalances in the rangeland-livestock-human system.
     However, the project has potentially extremely important global-environmental implications. It is thought that the vast steppe lands of the Central Asian Republics (formerly part of the Soviet Union) may absorb large quantities of carbon dioxide (CO2)—an important ‘greenhouse gas’ which contributes to global warming, so the more that is absorbed by plant activity, the better. The US universities in collaboration with Central Asia scientists and ICARDA are measuring carbon sequestration in these lands. If steppe lands do act as a large carbon sink, it will be important to look at ways of developing this sink potential. The steppe is often in bad condition, which probably reduces its potential as a carbon sink. ICARDA scientists are focusing on ways to improve rangeland management and associated production systems—sustainably.
     Another livestock project is on Central Asian Range and Sheep Evaluation. This is an important new area of collaboration for ICARDA and the USA in which scientists from ICARDA, USDA/ARS Range Sheep Production Efficiency Unit in Dubois, Idaho, and the USDA/ARS Forage and Range Research Laboratory in Logan, Utah, work together to address problems of range sheep production and improve forage resources, with the long-term aim of contributing to environmental protection and increased livestock production in the Central Asian Republics.
    A legacy of the transition to a free market economy in the republics of Central Asia is a lack of clear policies on land tenure and property rights. ICARDA and the University of Wisconsin’s Land Tenure Center at Madison are preparing research proposals on policy and property rights in relation to range-livestock systems.
     From 1985 to 1994, ICARDA implemented the Arid Zones Research (AZR) component of USAID’s Management of Agricultural Research and Technology (MART) project in Balochistan, Pakistan. Rangeland degradation is a serious problem in the dry, highland areas of Pakistan, where large increases in human and livestock population have severely strained the carrying capacity of the grazing land. A multidisciplinary team of four ICARDA scientists, together with a scientist from Colorado State University, were posted to the Arid Zone Research Institute (AZRI) in Quetta, Balochistan, to strengthen research in these areas. The overall goal of the project, which lasted from 1985 to 1990, was to strengthen the capacity of AZRI to develop and implement a research program to improve livestock feed supply, livestock management, water management in the crop and rangelands, and productivity, while protecting and rehabilitating the natural-resource base, especially the rangelands.
     The initial success of the program, and the need for a long-term approach to institutional strengthening, prompted the development of a second phase (1990–1994), with a team of three technical advisors—a livestock scientist, agronomist and agricultural economist—from ICARDA.
     Project achievements included the work on fourwing saltbush (Atriplex canescens), a drought-tolerant shrub which has considerable potential as livestock feed. In experiments, forage reserves allowed significant daily gains in live weight of sheep for a third of the year. Salt bush can also provide 300–600 kg of fuelwood per hectare over one year. The experimental program was followed by an expanding on-farm program. Catchment-basin water harvesting was another important topic of research in this area of water scarcity.
     Work on improved varieties of local food crops resulted in the release of several new lines: bread wheat (AZRI-96); barley (Sanober-96); lentil (Shiraz-96) and vetch (Kulak-96).
     An important part of the project was designed to strengthen AZRI’s institutional capacity as part of efforts to develop an integrated research program with national, regional and international institutions for these dry areas and as part of a wider program for the whole country. A significant part of this was the training associated with MART/AZRI, which in addition to the short-term specialized training saw four members of AZRI complete their MSc, and six their PhD programs, at overseas universities. This training equipped them to address the main problems facing Balochistan, in particular the rehabilitation of the degraded ranges and the nutrition of small ruminants. This training has also been important for the ongoing rangeland monitoring and rehabilitation joint mini-project, which started in January 1995, after the end of the main collaborative project.

Changes in traditional practices mean that overgrazing by livestock close to villages in Central Asia is threatening rangeland
sustainability and putting fragile rural economies at risk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Measurement of CO2 sequestration by rangeland vegetation may reveal a new role for the steppe in reducing global warming.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A farmers’ market in Balochistan where ICARDA implemented part of a major USAID project.