Rumbidzayi Zinyuke Manicaland Bureau
FARMERS in Chipinge have been urged to embrace artificial insemination (AI) to improve livestock breeds as a way of boosting incomes for smallholder producers. Artificial insemination is the process of collecting sperm cells from a male animal and manually depositing them into the reproductive tract of a female. It is commonly used instead of natural mating in many species of animals because of the many benefits it can reap.
Zimbabwe Farmers’ Union Manicaland provincial manager Mr Daniel Mungazi last week said in-breeding had become a major problem in the quality of animals being produced by farmers in Chipinge district.
“The breed of cattle in that area has deteriorated because of in-breeding and the farmers have proposed to pool resources to buy bulls that can service the whole community to improve the breeds. While this would be a good way to improve the quality of cattle farmers produce for sale, there is also the option of artificial insemination, which is also very effective if done properly,” he said.
He said farmers could learn how to carry out AI themselves as it was cheaper than hiring third parties to do it for them. Mr Mungazi noted that knowledge on AI was still low among communal farmers who still relied on natural mating to increase their herd. Most farmers also depended on veterinarians and extension workers to carry out the process on their behalf.
“Knowledge on AI has been low but we have been carrying out farmer training to increase awareness. We teach them the technicalities of artificial insemination including the ideal time to inseminate and how to do it properly. We also try to teach them how to separate the animals to avoid mating until AI is done,” he said.
Mr Mungazi said farmers who had benefited from such training in Buhera three years ago were now seeing the good results as they were producing cattle that were almost four times better than before they started using artificial insemination thus fetching better prices on the market. “Our farmers there now appreciate that livestock farming is a business and it needs to be done properly to realise maximum benefits in terms of income,” he added.
According to experts, natural mating is a stressful process that has a much higher tendency to result in injuries or accidents to both the animals and producers while artificial insemination can reduce many of those risks involved with breeding. The process is also believed to reduce the risk of diseases.