`I don't understand you,' said Alice. `It's dreadfully confusing!' `That's the effect of living backwards,' the Queen saidkindly: `It always makes one a little giddy at first -- `Living backwards!' Alice repeated in great astonishment. `I never heard of such a thing!' ` -- but there's one great advantage in it, that one's memory works both ways.' `I'm sure mine only works one way.' Alice remarked. `I can't remember things before they happen.' `It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,' the Queen remarked.
Through the Looking Glass (And What Alice Found There)
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Livestock's economic importance goes beyond direct food production. Skins, fibers, manure (fertiliser or fuel), draught power, and capital are also livestock benefits. Livestock provides a lifeline for a large proportion of the 95 percent of the world's rural population that lives in the developing world and cultivates 64 percent of the world's arable land. People in developing countries have access to less than 20 percent of the industrial machinery and 40 percent of the chemical fertiliser produced in the world. The draught power and nutrient recycling inputs of their farm animals, which compensate for the lack of access to the modern inputs, help to maintain the economic viability and environmental integrity of their farms. Furthermore, livestock care is intricately interwoven with the social fabric of many societies, and in many situations, livestock constitute the main, if not the only, capital reserve of farming households, serving as a strategic reserve that reduces risk to the farmer and adds stability to the overall farming system.
Steinfeld (1998) considers that the livestock sector in Asia is under pressure to expand and to adapt. Under current conditions, this adaptation involves mainly functions and species, with the greatest change being the increase in the number of monogastrics and poultry. Livestock production is growing faster in the moister, more densely populated areas, and there is a general trend towards expansion and to vertical integration with the formation of product-specific, whole-production chains. This threatens the breakdown of traditional mixed farming and pastoral systems everywhere, as economic growth and/or demographic pressure provides the incentive for the industrial-type production. He observes that technological changes are creating modern, demand-driven and capital-intensive production chains for poultry meat, eggs, pork and dairy products, leaving the traditional, resource-driven and labour-intensive sector to smallholder farms. Smallholder farmers are therefore being excluded from the high-growth sector where economic returns are potentially high.
Contributions from the livestock sector to the economy have been largely underestimated in the past and although it is clear that the relative importance of the non-food benefits of livestock will decrease, nevertheless livestock provide for a wide range of human needs. The challenge now is to increase the productivity of livestock and the quality of livestock products and provide access to markets so as to assist in maintaining food security and relieving poverty, while maintaining the physical environment and protecting human health.