JOHANNESBURG - The member of the executive council for the Department of Rural Development and Agrarian Reform in South Africa's Eastern Cape province, Nomakhosazana Meth, has handed over Nguni Bulls to farmers in O.R Tambo district as part of a programme aimed at improving the poor genetic make-up of their livestock.
In a statement issued late on Thursday, the department said the objective was to ensure that communal and smallholder red meat producers in the Mhlontlo and KSD local municipalities could participate competitively on the market.
"The overall goal of the livestock improvement scheme is to develop a cadre of black smallholder cattle farmers who will join the commercial beef farming value chain, enhance sustainable livestock production in previously disadvantaged communities, improve their economic participation in the red meat value-chain, and create black commercial beef farmers," it said.
All the recipients carry out their farming in communal space and therefore require resistant animals.
The department said it had opted for Nguni cattle as they were less prone to dystocia, which means difficult labour.
The breed also develops excellent resistance to ticks and immunity to tick borne diseases, with both the incidence of disease and mortality being low.
Nguni cattle are also excellent foragers and graze and browse on steep slopes and in thick bush alike.
Nguni cattle, which are special to southern Africa, are descended from Sanga cattle, the collective name for the indigenous animals of the sub-Saharan region which originated in East Africa, probably the western shores of Lake Victoria, and have spread up the river Nile.
- African News Agency (ANA)