One cow, ten calves in one year

A cow’s gestation period is nine months, right? And so it is impossible for a cow to get more than one calf in a year, right? Wrong.

A new technology is set to change breeding as we know it, making it possible to have up to 10 calves or more from the same cow, all in one year.

The technology involves the transfer of fertilised embryos from a donor cow to one or more surrogate mothers, which then carry the embryo to the end of the pregnancy. The point to this is enabling the production of pedigree animals through less productive ones.

Hence, you can get 10 mini-copies of your prize Friesian cow within a year, through the help of your Zebu or Boranas, which after maturation, will be producing milk just like the Friesian.

The East Africa Semen and Embryo Transfer Association currently offers the embryo transfer service, known as Embryo Technology, with the support of the World Bank’s East African Agricultural Productivity Project.

“It is possible to induce a cow to super-ovulate four to five times a year. Ten calves or more can be produced per cow, per year,” says Dr Maurice Cherogony, the semen association executive officer.

One farmer, Dr Peter Ithondeka from Nyandarua County, is quite happy with the results; he got 12 pedigree animals out of his Borana cows in just a year.

Maximum benefit from your animals

“This is the shortest and surest way of reaping maximum benefit from your animals,” he says. “It outdoes the use of artificial insemination because you don’t need to wait 15 years to get a pedigree herd.”

Another farmer, Mr George Rutto, who bought an Embryo Transfer bull, also waxes lyrical on the technology, averring that it enables farmers to get the ‘best of the best’ animals.

“If you have a cow giving 50 litres of milk per day, you can fertilise its eggs and transfer them to an animal that is not as productive. The animal that is produced will be a replica of the productive one. So you can get a bigger and higher quality herd within the shortest period of time.”

Despite these rave reviews, ET technology’s sexiness quotient is extremely low (nothing close to the quail egg venture, for instance). What’s holding farmers back from adopting it in droves?

“We have not been able to demonstrate enough success that farmers can feel comfortable with. Like any other technique, it needs a lot of practice. Because of the expense needed to carry it out ET, few farmers are ready to do this on a regular basis. We get to practise about once or twice a month, but this is not enough,” Dr Cherogony says.

Farmer Rutto reckons that a few people may have heard about it but not taken keen interest. “It may be that they think it is out of their reach. It is also expensive.”

Indeed, farmers may have been kept away by the issue of finance. The minimum cost of an EASETA embryo transfer package of sexed semen is currently Sh320,000, but the package involoves three donors and up to 15 recipients. A regular heifer costs Sh300,000.

This is a barrier Dr Cherogony recognises: “One of the frustrations we are facing is that of many farmers lacking the finances to take up these services. What we, therefore, hope to do is to get farmers to access finance so as to build a critical mass to enable us to do it more often.”

To deal with this, they have reached out to local financial institutions to subsidise and give loans and credit services to farmers.

Apart from helping farmers access finance, the organisation also links those who do not have high quality donor cattle with breeders that do. They, however, encourage farmers to team up with neighbors or get into co-operatives in order to minimise costs.

Dr Cherogony explains that apart form transferring embryos, this venture also offers farmers the opportunity get involved in the production and sale of embryos themselves, where they can avail them to other farmers for profit.

EASETA also plans to set up a station for semen production in order to improve the quality of the local genetic pool.

It has also worked with the University of Nairobi, KARI, ILRI and ADC to promote the research in a remarkable illustration of how public-private partnerships can add value to an industry.