51
52
The Goat Industry Development Project (GIDP) was launched by USDA to assist Armenian agriculture in developing independent and economically viable dairy goat production, product manufacturing and marketing through technology transfer.
Within the framework of GIDP, USDA worked with the only goat research institute in the United States of America, the E. (Kika) de la Garza American Institute for Goat Research at Langston University, Langston, Oklahoma, to develop a breeding programme for the recording, selection and multiplication of improved goat genetics. Local villagers were eager to receive cross-bred goats from Western and local Armenian varieties, and so the Armenian Improved Dairy Center (ARID) became an official breeding centre in Septem-ber 2000. ARID is located in Vayots Dzor Province, Yeghegnadzor, southeastern Armenia.
Participants in GIDP are cooperatives and individual goat farms, associations, milk col-lection units and cheese factories, ARID’s repository for improved goat genetics and its training in goat farming practices. ARID’s breeding programme focuses on the genetic improvement of domestic Armenian goats through successive generation crosses to develop high-producing animals of four dairy breeds: Saanen, Alpine, Toggenburg and Nubian. With the assistance of USDA, 30 pure-bred goats were imported from the United States of America in May 2000.
The 129 pure-bred goats at the ARID centre, along with the 4 000 cross-breeds produced by 1 April 2014 in cooperating farms, are descendants of the imported goats.
Annually, more than 125 beneficiary goat farmers, cheese producers, veterinarians, ex-tension specialists, breeding specialists, fodder producers, employees, etc. are involved in project activities, including at least 36 women and 75 rural young people.
ARID’s activities within the framework of GIDP are as follows:
1. Service provision for:
• goat breeding/cross-breeding with pure-bred bucks and artificial insemination;
• herd health management through veterinary service provision;
• record-keeping and herd management.
2. On-farm research, including with the participation of scientists from the Armenian Agrarian University on:
• breeding and genetic improvement of goats;
• comparison of milk characteristics and production among native, cross-bred and pure-bred goats;
• comparison of growth and carcass characteristics among cross-bred, native and pure-bred goats.
3. Technical assistance to farmers, producers, extensionists, agribusinesses, students and young people on:
• proper nutrition, housing and care management;
• animal health and disease prevention;
• proper milking and milk handling procedures;
• grazing management;
• cooperative and financial management.
4. Training and education for farmers, producers, extensionists, students and young people via:
• seminars and workshops at the ARID centre;
53
• hands-on seminars and workshops in farms and villages.
5. Implementation of a youth project.
The valuable achievements of project implementation are:
• development of goat breeding technologies;
• improved body growth through cross-breeding;
• improved and increased milk production among goat herds (Figure 1).
Table 1. shows the average daily body growth of kids recorded in the project.
TABLE 1. AVERAGE DAILY BODY GROWTH OF KIDS IN GIDP, ARMENIA
Pure-breeds 195–200 g
Cross-breeds 150–180 g Native breeds 120–130 g
FIGURE 1. EVOLUTION OF MILK PRODUCTIVITY AT GIDP GOAT FARMS IN ARMENIA
Additional achievements are as follows:
• There is increased interest in goat farming among farm-ers. In 2000, two goat farmers from Vayots Dzor were involved in GIDP; in 2013, the project worked with 28 farmers.
• There are increased goat numbers throughout Armenia because the imported goats are well adapted to envi-ronmental conditions. In 1999, there were 12 000 goats in Armenia; in 2013, there were 30 500.
• There are improved milking technologies and proper milk storage facilities have been established.
• High-quality goat dairy products such as feta, tom
and ricotta have been launched and an export market has been developed. In 2013, more than 100 tonnes of goat milk was processed and about 17 tonnes of high-quality goat cheeses were produced.
Photo 3: goat cheese factory at Salli village (source: Babayan, 2014)
54
Photo 4 and 5: cheese variestes produced at "Selim"LTD and "Golden Goat"LTD (source: Babayan 2014)
The development of small and medium-sized enterprises in the dairy sector has played a significant role in providing jobs, increasing farm incomes and improving the overall livelihoods of rural people in targeted communities.
However, to ensure the sustainability of food production and agricultural development, the market still requires expansion and improvement.
Through the improvement of farm and herd health management, and the breeding and artificial insemination programmes implemented by the ARID Goat Center, the efficiency of animal husbandry has been enhanced, but is still low. Milk yield per head is still a limitation for tens of thousands of farmers in Armenia.
There is significant need to improve grazing management and ensure the proper use of pastures and their protection from erosion. USDA’s overall goals for GIDP in Arme-nia were poverty reduction; improvement of small farmers’ operational environment;
introduction of new technology to increase productivity; and improvement of farmers’
living standards through the creation of opportunities and conditions for market access.
To achieve these goals, GIDP began by developing, testing and providing proven, glob-al-quality genetics, developing and promoting economical feeding systems, and imple-menting disease control interventions to help increase animal productivity.
The tactics employed to achieve these general and specific objectives included establish-ing small dairies in villages for processestablish-ing goat milk; supportestablish-ing and improvestablish-ing traditional Armenian cheese production and developing new types of goat cheese; examining the options for direct marketing and transportation; establishing a local niche market for goat milk products; and developing an export market. In a variety of sectors, USDA worked at all levels, from the farmgate to the development of international markets.
Conclusions
The ARID Goat Center learned three valuable lessons through its involvement in GIDP’s development of a viable commercial goat industry: i) with solid, upfront market re-search, an entire industry can be started and made to thrive in a short time; ii) using USDA’s development model for Armenia – which consisted of offering an integrated package of technical, marketing and financial assistance – an agriculture sector can ex-pand to supply new products for not only domestic but also international consumption;
and iii) every link in the marketing chain, from farmgate to fork, must be developed and complete to support the shift from domestic to international marketing, and this must be accomplished by offering the latest technical assistance to committed local partners.
55
Photo 6: Annual contest at ARID center of youth clubs involved in goat farming (Source: Babayan, 2014)
Photo 7: Native doe and F1 kid at Rind goat farm (Babayan, 2014)
57