01/18/07 Extincition II

Extinction II Yesterday, I told you about the loss of domesticated animal breeds. Today, I'll tell you what this means to world communities. I'm Jeff Keane; I'll be back in one minute with some thoughts. While some people might not consider the loss of domestic animals nearly as alarming as say a kangaroo rat that might loose one nesting site, many of the world population depend greatly on these animal species. Livestock agriculture plays an important part in the livelihood of about one billion people worldwide, not to mention the billions and billions of people these animals feed and provide with essential products. An article in the Western Livestock Reporter goes on to say nearly 70 percent of the world rural poor depend on livestock to contribute to their livelihoods. So you can see domestic livestock breeds are pretty important to a large proportion of the world's population. Now, while this report does come from a United Nation's entity and while I feel the United Nations is maybe not the most functional and important world group on some issues this study does give a person cause for thought. Losing these less productive and popular breeds as far as world markets go is not such a big thing, but the fact is we are loosing genetics that may be useful in future years to develop new breeds and crossbreds that would fit changing environmental conditions. Changes that may come about even here in the U.S. where we are losing 32 million acres of land each year to concrete, housing and roads. It is something to think about. I'm Jeff Keane. Western Livestock Reporter 12/27/06