about farm Animal breeding & reproduction
What is animal breeding?
Animal breeding ensures a continuous improvement of farm animals, generation after generation. Different animal traits are measured and the best animals are used as parent-animals. In this way, breeders provide livestock farmers with a next generation of animals. Farm animal breeders have an essential contribution to a healthy and sustainable food supply chain and to provide the European citizens with a diverse choice of affordable, safe and diverse quality animal foods, and the European landscape and culture with an attractive liveable countryside, a large sustainable variety of animal breeds, and tasteful local and typical animal food products. Animal breeding consists out of two phases: breeding and reproduction. The animal breeding and reproduction cycle takes approximately 5 years, depending on the specie. |
"Animal breeding: the selective mating of animals to increase the possibility of obtaining desired traits in the offspring"
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Objectives of breeding
Breeding is done for different reasons:
Breeding is done for different reasons:
- Production of food products (e.g. dairy, meat, eggs)
- Production of non- food products (e.g. wool, leather)
- Sports
- Companions
- Maintaining rural areas
- Medical applications/research
- Preservation of minor breeds, e.g. Jacob sheep
- Reintroduction programmes, e.g. golden lion tamarins
Sorts of breeding
There are three sorts of breeding:
Reproduction is a very important trait of an animal; reproductive efficiency is of economic importance.
There are three sorts of breeding:
- Cross-breeding: individuals of different breeds or lines are used to mate.
- Pure breeding: the same breed or lines are used to mate.
- Inbreeding: two close relatives mate. The closer the relation, the higher the inbreeding.
Reproduction is a very important trait of an animal; reproductive efficiency is of economic importance.
Developments in farm animal breeding
Farm animal breeding is an important contributor to improving food security and economic development. Read more. |
Breeding for a sustainable animal production
The need for animal products is increasing, thus sustainability becomes more important and necessary. Read more. |
Different species
Different species have different needs and species-specific challenges and opportunities. Read more. |