Forages and the gradual shift towards more intensive management

Alan Robertson Consultant

Workshop on forage and fodder tree selection for future challenges —Linking genebanks to forage use, Addis Ababa, 16-20 March 2015

Need programs across the spectrum

General thrust

• Support for intensification of livestock production

• Shift towards more grazing control, stall feeding

• Conspicuous benefits = high uptake rates (can only solve the problems with a high degree of spontaneous lateral spread)

• Widely diverse, scattered sites from the beginning

• Many (diverse) farmers from the beginning

• Farmers - forefront of screening/ promotion

• Diverse development strategies

• World-class genetic material

• Quick start

• Flexibility

Strategies

• Broad array

• Intensive and extensive

• All setting the stage for gradual intensification of livestock production

Intensive rainfed or irrigated:both need emphasis on high quality

i.e. shift away from Napier

Forage as a smallholder cash cropRole for manual baler

Irrigated forages

• Smallholder and commercial

• Irrigated lucerne !!!

• Other irrigation potential

– Mulato II + legume

– Guinea + legume

– Leucaena

– Desmanthus

Cover cropping

Annual forage crops and relay cropping

Push- pullStem-borer, striga, Parthenium

Protection of crop land

Forages and weed control

Reinforcement of stock exclosures

Desmanthus spp

Oversowing(broadcasting legume seed e.g. 0.5 - 1kg/ha)

Seeding 2,000ha per trip ?

Environmental diversity(Need wide array of genetic material)

Genetic material

Should Ethiopian farmers have access to the best genetic material available ??

Need productive, high quality forages(milk and fattening)

And

Genetic material for marginal areas, stock exclusion areas, etc

Forage Arachis(perennial)

American jointvetch

Desmanthus leptophyllus

Greenleaf Desmodium

Mulato II

LeucaenaAustralia: 1.4kg/hd/day

Need to emphasise species/strategies with potential for spontaneous adoption

Screening approaches

• Research stations ?

• FTCs ?

• Woreda nurseries ?

• Farmers’ fields, exclusion areas etc

Requires time to show potential Livestock performance !

Multiplication(major demand and the funding to support it)

but seed production is very complicated!!

Need to define target species

• Commercial livestock

• Meeting needs of poor smallholders

• Stock exclusion/ communal grazing areas

• Pastoralist areas

Indicative Capacity within 5 years(tonnes / annum)

Capacity

Grass seed 20 Absolute quality control

Grass - vegetative Unlimited Scattered sites

Legumes - vegetative Unlimited Scattered sites

Common Annual legumes Unlimited Shift from subsidy

Herbaceous legumes (stylos,Desmanthus etc)

400 Carefully selected areas

Jointvetch 400 Opportunistic harvest

Climbing legumes (e.g. for exclusion areas)

200 Carefully selected areas

Tree legumes 1000 Opportunistic harvest

Wynn Cassia etc ? Import

Production systems

• Institutional farms? (FTCs?)

• Larger commercial farms

• Smallholder farms ***********

• Specific seed production areas ? or

• Opportunistic harvesting ?

Can smallholders produce quality seed efficiently ?

Stylosanthes hamata cv Verano Kg/ha

Australian Commercial,mechanised 300 - 400

Thai research 400 incr to 600

Thai smallholder 800 – 1200 (export quality)

(Still smallholders after 35 years)

Smallholder forage seed production

Thailand (since 1976) Capacity for 1000 t perennial legume seed500 t grass seed

India (Ananthapur) 1000 t Stylosanthes hamatap.a.

Hirna (1988) 2,000 kg Siratro *** from 2ha

Robit, Gojam (1991) 50 tonnes Stylosantheshamata *****(400-800kg/ha)

Ethiopia (1980s) 20 tonnes Leucaena p.a. @EB1/kg

Smallholder production systems

• Select areas suited to efficient seed production !! (Generally, head north !)

• Clusters of farmers

• Very close supervision

• Firm contracts

The Thai Model

• Very long term institutional support (govt and bilateral).. Strong technical support

• Big volumes as soon as possible• Gradual private sector involvement• Very close supervision of contract farmers (2,000)• Absolute attention to quality from beginning• Reliability /credibility• Rapid adoption/ promotion of new material• Immediate attention to emerging export

potential

Thai seed (smallholder contract)Production is constrained only by the

market !!Germ

%Purity

%Farm gate

EB/kgSellingEB/kg

ProductnCapacity

(t / a)

Stylos 99 98 65 160 1000 Match production to expected market

Mulato II 90 99 140 280 300 Match production to expected market

Determining pricing

• Volume of demand ?

• Likely yields

• Labor requirements

• Need for supervision ?

• Returns from alternative crops

• Need some flexibility, but…very difficult to reduce contract prices

Indicative contract prices

Leucaena EB 5 /kg ***

Per.herb. Legumes (Stylos, Desmanthus) EB 50 /kg

Jointvetch (Aeschynomene spp) EB 20 /kg **

Climbing per. Legumes (axillaris etc) EB 50 /kg

Grass- vegetative EB 400 / pick-up load ??

Legumes - vegetative, stripped of leaves EB 600/pick-up load

*** Difficult to reduce contract prices significantly

*** High prices will make large-scale sowing untenable.

Alfalfa seed

EB / kg

Ethiopia farm gate price 350 Unknown genetics ??

Ethiopia sale price 500-550

Australia farm gate price 55 Known genetics, cultivars for specific locations, constantly upgraded

Australia sale price 130

Seed or vegetative?

Rhodes grass establishment

EB / kg

Rec. seeding rate (kg/ha)

Planting matlCost / ha

Eth. commercial 350 6 - 8 2100 - 2800 Slow, unreliableestablishment

Aust. commercial 300 1-2 300-600

Vegetativeestablishment 6person days/ha

480 Reliable establishment, cutting within 6 weeks.

Vegetative multiplication

All grasses for smallholders Many legumes

Small back-yard nurseries (pre-season) and transplanting at beginning of rains

Very wide scattering of sites (on-farm, FTCs, stock market centres, schools)

Free or local barter/ payment Planting-out when season is right

Leucaena nursery(inoculated, bare-root / bare-stem)

Spontaneous spread through livestock(Don’t always need long-term seed supply)

FTC’s demonstration or multiplication value ?

Aiming at spontaneous adoptionWe don’t want to be distributing planting material forever!

(need conspicuously useful species)

Many delivery optionsTry them all !!

Schools forage program(for 3-4 superior species)

Highly cost-effective Very wide, quick coverage