A REVIEW ON EFFICIENCY OF ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION IN CATTLE BREEDING IN ETHIOPIA

Abstract

Ethiopia has large cattle population in Africa. The output of decades of crossbreeding programme in Ethiopia through AI service was quite insignificant because the exotic breeds and their crossbreds of the country accounted for about 1.44%. The objective of this review is to present the efficiency of Artificial Insemination (AI) service in cattle breeding in Ethiopia. The optimum recommended mean number of services per conception (NSC) for profitable dairy cow is about 1.4. However, conventional cattle AI breeding indicated that the mean NSC of different studies ranged from 1.14 in local cows up to 2.47 in different genotypes of cows kept under different management systems and conception rate at first insemination (CR1) ranged from 7.14% to 75.5% in different genotypes of dairy cows kept under extensive and intensive management systems. Estrus synchronization followed AI breeding indicated that CR1 ranged from 24.69% to 70.6% in Zebu cows kept under semi-intensive management system. Calving rate (CR) is the most appropriate measure of fertility of dairy cows which is defined as the number of calves born per 100 services. The poor efficiency of the country cattle AI service is a huge biological economic loss in cattle production and managerial monetary losses. Strategic interventions on cattle AI service efficiency improvement options should be identified and practiced considering breed type, production system and agro-ecology.