Climate change has a significant effect on the productivity of livestock including milk, meat, and reproduction. This could be attributed to the internal diversion of energy resources towards adaptive mechanisms. Among the climate change variables, thermal stress seems to be the major limiting factor in animal agriculture. A better understanding of the effects of climate change-influenced ecological factors on the genetic diversity of livestock species is warranted. Sheep is an ideal livestock species to be used in investigating environmental adaptation due to its wide range of agroecological habitats, genetic and phenotypic variability. There is a heavy reliance on sheep genetic diversity for future animal protein security, but the implications of climate change on their genetic diversity receive less attention.

The focus of this review is to offer an overview of food and nutritional security, to identify associated constraints, and propose possible alternative solutions for improving the East African poultry sub-sector in the pursuit of food security, focusing on chicken breeding. To better understand the prospects of the poultry industry, we highlighted and combined confirming evidence of the phenotypic variability and genetic diversity of East African chicken genetic resources using both morphological and molecular tools, as well as performance traits. Furthermore, this work gives a detailed indication of what would be lost if indigenous chicken populations are left to suffer the ongoing massive genetic erosions due to various factors, not limited to indiscriminate crossbreeding. Previous and recent attempts to improve the productivity of indigenous chicken are highlighted, and possible future breeding plans and areas of immediate research are suggested as well. This review concludes that under the prevailing conditions, the village chicken production system appears to be the most imperious production system that needs to be extensively developed ; however, for the sustainability of the industry, the proposed improvement strategies should create a permanent balance between the competing needs of genetic improvement and the genetic diversity of the indigenous chicken genetic resource.

Indigenous goats are important in the livelihoods of rural households in East African countries. This is due to their ability to produce and reproduce in different environments and climatic conditions. Even though these indigenous goats are important, there is little available information on the genetic characterization of these breeds in Africa and at the international level. This paper reviews the status of indigenous goats, highlighting their production systems, phenotypic and genetic characteristics, and genetic diversity, and proposes potential ways for sustainable improvement and conservation in East African countries. Most households use traditional production systems with various uncharacterized goat breeds and ecotypes, which are hence named after the tribe or locality in which they are found. Most of these goats are classified as small East African breeds, with significant variability in morphological features. Some of the challenges to goat production in this region are indiscriminate crossbreeding, lack of pedigree records, parasites and disease incidences, low-quality pastures, and low levels of management. There is a need for a collaborative approach amongst the actors in goat breeding value chains as well as integrating modern genomic tools into breeding programs to enhance selection. This will ensure the resilience and sustainability of these unique indigenous goat populations in East Africa

Purpose: Institutional change (IC) programs in the public sector are often driven by sustainability and digitalisation as contextual factors, contributing to the development of digital and sustainable governance (DSG) systems. This study aims to explore the longitudinal impact of ICs on DSG advancements.Design/methodology/approach: We collected and analysed data of 200 public sector organisations in two European countries and conducted a longitudinal analysis, focusing on the impact of European Union-funded IC programs.Findings: Results show that steps towards digital governance (DG) are demonstrably linked to environmental efforts, and EU-funded IC programs could have a long-term positive impact on digital and environmentally sustainable governance in Europe. Findings, however, highlight the unbalanced nature of sustainability governance, as environmental and policy-related conditions and activities seem to be overemphasised.Practical implications: Environmental policy seems to be established, but future DG initiatives should consider more environmental polity conditions and activities (e.g. dedicated departments), as well as economic and social sustainability to ensure well-balanced governance systems.Originality/value: To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that explores empirically how prior IC programs affect future DSG in the public sector.

Dorper sheep was developed for meat production in arid and semi-arid regions under extensive production systems in South Africa. Two variants with distinct head and neck colors were bred during their development process. White Dorper have a white coat while Dorper have a black head and neck. Both variants have grown in popularity around the world. Therefore, understanding the genomic architecture between South African Dorpers and Dorper populations adapted to other climatic regions, as well as genomic differences between Dorper and White Dorper variants is vital for their molecular management. Using the ovine 50K SNP chip, this study compared the genetic architecture of Dorper variants between populations from South Africa and Hungary. The Dorper populations in both countries had high genetic diversity levels, although Dorper in Hungary showed high levels of inbreeding. White Dorpers from both countries were genetically closely related, while Dorpers were distantly related according to principal component analysis and neighbor-joining tree. Additionally, whereas all groups displayed unique selection signatures for local adaptation, Dorpers from Hungary had a similar linkage disequilibrium decay. Environmental differences and color may have influenced the genetic differentiation between the Dorpers. For their molecular management and prospective genomic selection, it is crucial to understand the Dorper sheep’s genomic architecture, and the results of this study can be interpreted as a step in this direction.

Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) poses significant challenges to livestock management and agricultural economies worldwide. This study examines the effect of farmers’ sociodemographic factors on livestock infected with Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) and analyzes its socioeconomic impact on smallholder farmers in Indonesia. This study collected data from 992 households (202 infected and 790 non-infected) in the special region of Yogyakarta province. The research used propensity score matching (PSM) treatment effect analysis to assess the socioeconomic impact of FMD outbreaks on smallholder farmers. Our results demonstrated that FMD significantly increased (p < 0.01) smallholder farmers’ social behavior, including knowledge, attitude, and practice (KAP). Furthermore, farmers whose animals are already infected with FMD must spend an additional IDR 258,000 to IDR 270,000 on treatment compared to non-infected ones. This study provides empirical evidence that farmer characteristics, including women’s decision-making, income, farming group, and cattle ownership, determine the likelihood of FMD infection, which implies that farmers with specific characteristics may heighten the risk of FMD infection. We concluded that FMD has changed social behavior and accelerated economic loss for smallholder farmers. Hence, farmers with animals at risk of FMD infection are prioritized in FMD control programs.