Demographic changes in small ruminant population in India: some inferences from different livestock regions.

摘要

There is significant growth in population of small ruminants in India during the last three decades. Various economic and non-economic factors like prevalence of mass poverty, high population pressure on land, increasing landlessness, changing food habits, high income elasticity for meat and meat products could account for this growth in small ruminant population. The demand for small ruminants is basically a derived demand necessitated by the demand for mutton, milk, wool, hides, skins etc. In the present article, an attempt was made to explore the importance of small ruminant rearing in different livestock regions. The imbalances in large (cattle and buffalo) and small ruminant (sheep and goat) concentration is mainly due to demand for livestock products and availability of feed and fodder resources. This is largely on account of the vanishing common pasture and grazing lands. Hence, there is a need to have strong efforts to protect common property resources from increasing uses for non agriculture purposes and suitable technology should be developed for their improvement.