Saving Livestock Diversity

We hear on nearly a daily basis of yet another exotic or "wild" animal species being put on the endangered species list. What we don't hear about are all the numerous livestock and poultry breeds that are in danger of becoming extinct. That's where the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy organization steps in. The ALBC is a nonprofit membership driven group that has been working since 1977 to save historic livestock breeds. With the focus of today's food supply being on only a few highly specialized breeds diversity in animal agriculture has been declining at a rapid rate. This has lead the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization to estimate that nearly twenty percent of farm animal breeds are endangered; a shocking number to say the least. The breeds that are endangered include horses, pigs, chickens, cattle, goats, sheep, and Ben Franklin would be shocked, turkeys. In the effort to improve certain traits in livestock breeds their biodiversity has been lost. As with humans, the animal kingdom, wild or domestic, should not be limited to a select few "high performers". To do so almost assuredly guarantees our own demise.