 Cattle numbers, biomass, productivity and land degradation in the commercial farming sector of Namibia, 1915-95Glenn-Marie Lange, Jonathan Barnes and Daniel Motinga Development Southern Africa, 1998, vol. 15, issue 4, 555-572 Abstract: As part of a natural resource accounting project undertaken in Namibia, livestock accounts have been drawn up and are being used to analyse the relationship between numbers of livestock, rainfall, land degradation, and economic and policy variables. Part of the analysis concerns an investigation into trends in cattle numbers, changes in cattle biomass and the productivity of livestock in commercial areas. Cattle numbers increased from 1914 until 1960, then declined steadily to half that number. This decline was at least partly due to deliberate actions by farmers to improve herd productivity and production efficiency. Although beef production did not decline over this period, productivity is still lower than potential industry standards. Range degradation (bush encroachment) may have contributed to this curtailment. This investigation has implications for an understanding of long-term carrying capacity, land degradation and rangeland management, and for agricultural development policies in Namibia and similar regions in southern Africa. Date: 1998 Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:deveza:v:15:y:1998:i:4:p:555-572 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from DOI: 10.1080/03768359808440031 Access Statistics for this article Development Southern Africa is currently edited by Marie Kirsten More articles in Development Southern Africa from Taylor & Francis Journals |
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