Abstract

Sheep production is probably one of the oldest productions in the world. In early years this animal was considered as a domestic and productive one, since it provided families with milk, meat and wool. Besides providing all these products, the animals were not difficult to grow. They fed on many different floras that others would leave so their owners started to walk great distances with them to get the best grazing spots in winter and in summer. They called this transhumance. But in nowadays, animal feed became easier to get to. It was no longer necessary to move all the animals to pastures hundreds of kilometers away, and producers started going for shorter distances. Production also got more intensive, although sheep production was always considered to be more extensive rather than intensive. With this revision we intend to go over all the statistics concerning this production in Portugal and compare it in different years, to establish a correlation between them. Although sheep production is made entirely with autochthonous breeds and these are milk and meat production oriented, the meat production has a higher relevance in the sector. So it was necessary to make a more thorough approach to this production. There is also an interest in new and emergent ways of production which we discuss at the end of this revision, along with a small global analysis.

Highlights

  • The main purpose of this research is to give an overview of the food chain of sheep and goat in Portugal bearing in mind that all the production chain is from the producer to the market.How to cite this paper: Tibério, M.L. and Diniz, F. (2014) Sheep and Goat Production in Portugal: A Dynamic View

  • We considered some studies made between 1999 and 2009 and an analysis from 2012

  • Sheep farms have a more balanced regional distribution, the ones located in Entre Douro e Minho (EDM 24%); Beira Litoral (BL 22%); Alentejo (ALE 16%) and Ribatejo and Oeste (RO 14%) do stand out (Figure 3)

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Summary

Introduction

The main purpose of this research is to give an overview of the food chain of sheep and goat in Portugal bearing in mind that all the production chain is from the producer to the market. (2014) Sheep and Goat Production in Portugal: A Dynamic View. The content from several other studies was summarized into this revision with the purpose of gathering some scattered information about sheep production. It is a descriptive research that uses quantitative information, provided by the National Statistics Institute (INE), on the development of farms and sheep and goat populations at national and regional levels as well as the characteristic elements of production and domestic consumption of meat from these two species. The study uses the qualitative information gathered from various secondary sources

Farmers and Sheep Herd
Sheep Production Structure
Farmers and Goat Herds
Goat Production Structure
Autochthonous Breeds in the Frame of Sheep and Goat National Production
Production Systems and Rank Organization
Sheep and Goat Meat and Milk Production
Producer Prices
Main Source and Destination Markets
Qualified Products in Sheep and Goat Production
Alternative Sheep Production
Global Analysis
Findings
Conclusion
Full Text
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