Horses and rangelands: Mutual contributions and perspectives

Chevaux et parcours: apports mutuels et perspectives

Magali Jouven (), Fabienne Launay and Celine Vial ()
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Magali Jouven: UMR SELMET - Systèmes d'élevage méditerranéens et tropicaux - Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - Montpellier SupAgro - Centre international d'études supérieures en sciences agronomiques - Montpellier SupAgro - Institut national d’études supérieures agronomiques de Montpellier, Montpellier SupAgro - Institut national d’études supérieures agronomiques de Montpellier
Fabienne Launay: IDELE - Institut de l'élevage
Celine Vial: Marchés, Organisations, Institutions et Stratégies d'Acteurs - Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - CIHEAM-IAMM - Centre International de Hautes Etudes Agronomiques Méditerranéennes - Institut Agronomique Méditerranéen de Montpellier - CIHEAM - Centre International de Hautes Études Agronomiques Méditerranéennes - Montpellier SupAgro - Institut national d’études supérieures agronomiques de Montpellier, Institut Français du Cheval et de l'Equitation

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Abstract: Horses are increasingly present in pastoral areas but little is known about their potential contribution to rangeland utilization. In order to investigate this question in the context of Southern France, a specific research project was undertaken, with: 1) a farm-scale analysis to determine the importance of rangelands for horse feeding in agro-pastoral farming systems and 2) a territorial analysis to identify the role and importance of horses for pastoral areas, based on inventories, spatial analysis with GIS and interviews with local stakeholders. Among the "professional" equine farms we investigated, only a few feeding systems relied mainly on rangelands. In the other farms, rangeland utilization was limited due to lack of land, equipment or pastoral knowledge. At the territorial scale, horses were rarely accepted as proper rangeland users and the access of horse owners to land depended on the evolution of local ruminant farms. For a number of stakeholders, horses can help reducing land abandonment and show interesting complementarities with ruminants. Further research is needed about the interest of associating horses with ruminants for rangeland utilization at farm and landscape scales.

Date: 2014-06-24
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Published in Joint meeting of the "Mountain Pastures, Mediterranean Forage Resources (FAO-CIHEAM) and Mountain Cheese" networks, Jun 2014, Clermont-Ferrand, France. pp.843

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02739389

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