Strategies for Enhancement in Food Production

Food is a substance to require body nutritional. There are five Revolutions are involved in Food Production.

1. Blue Revolution- Fish Production
2. Green Revolution- Food Grains
3. Red Revolution- Meat Production
4. Silver Fiber Revolution- Cotton Production
5. White Revolution – Milk/Dairy Production

White Revolution- Milk/Dairy Production:

Animal Breeding – It is the agricultural practice of breeding and raising livestock. Animal husbandry deals with the care and breeding of livestock like buffaloes, cows, pigs, horses, cattle, sheep, camels goats, etc., that are useful to humans.

Management of Farms and Farm Animals:

1) Dairy Farm Management:
Dairying is the management of animals for milk and its products for human consumption.  In dairy farm management, we deal with processes and systems that increase yield and improve quality of milk.

• Selection of good breeds having high yielding potential, combined with resistance to diseases is very important.
• Cattle have to be housed well, should have adequate water and be maintained disease free.
• The feeding of cattle should be carried out in a scientific manner (quality and quantity of fodder).
• Stringent cleanliness and hygiene are important while milking, storage, and transport of the milk and its products.

2) Poultry Farm Management:

• Poultry is the class of domesticated fowl used for food or for their eggs.
• Selection of disease-free and suitable breeds, proper and safe farm conditions, proper feed and water, and hygiene and health care are important components of poultry farm management.

Animal Breeding:

• Animal breeding aims at increasing the yield of animals and improving the desirable qualities of the produce.
• When breeding is between animals of the same breed it is called Inbreeding, while crosses between different breeds are called Outbreeding.

Inbreeding:

• It refers to the mating of more closely related individuals within the same breed for 4-6 generations.  The breeding strategy is, superior males and superior females of the same breed are identified and mated in pairs.
• Inbreeding increases Homozygosity. However, continued inbreeding, especially close inbreeding, usually reduces fertility and even productivity.  This is called Inbreeding Depression. Whenever this becomes a problem, selected animals of the breeding population should be mated with unrelated superior animals of the same breed.  This usually helps restore fertility and yield.

Out-breeding:
It is the breeding of the unrelated animals, which may be between individuals of the same breed or between different breeds or different species.

Out-crossing:
This is the practice of mating of animals within the same breed, but having no common ancestors on either side of their pedigree up to 4-6 generations.  The offspring of such a mating is known as an out-cross.  A single outcross often helps to overcome inbreeding depression.

Cross-breeding:
In this method, superior males of one breed are mated with superior females of another breed.  Cross-breeding allows the desirable qualities of two different breeds to be combined.  The progeny hybrid animals may themselves be used for commercial production. For example, Hisardale is a new breed of sheep developed in Punjab by crossing Bikaneri ewes and Marino rams.

Interspecific Hybridization:
In this method, male and female animals of two different species are mated.  In some cases, the progeny may combine desirable features of both the parents, and may be of considerable economic value. Eg. Mule.

Artificial Insemination:
Controlled breeding experiments are carried out using artificial insemination.  The semen is collected from the male that is chosen as a parent and injected into the reproductive tract of the selected female by the breeder.

The success rate of crossing mature male and female animals is fairly low even though artificial insemination is carried out.

To improve chances of successful production of hybrids, other means are also used (MOET).

Multiple Ovulation Embryo Transfer Technology (MOET):

In this method, a cow is administered hormones, with FSH-like activity, to induce follicular maturation and super ovulation-instead of one egg, which they normally yield per cycle; they produce 6-8 eggs.  The animal is either mated with an elite bull or artificially inseminated.  The fertilized eggs at 8-32 cells stages, are recovered non-surgically and transferred to surrogate mothers.  The genetic mother is available for another round of superovulation.

3) Bee-keeping / Apiculture:

Bee-keeping or Apiculture is the maintenance of hives of honeybees for the production of honey. There are several species of honeybees which can be reared.  Of these, the most common species is Apis indica.

Honey is a food of high nutritive value and also finds use in the indigenous systems of medicine.  Honeybee also produces beeswax, which finds many uses in industry, such as in the preparation of cosmetics and polishes of various kinds.

The following points are important for successful bee-keeping:

• Knowledge of the nature and habits of bees,
• Selection of suitable location for keeping the beehives,
• Catching and hiving of swarms (group of bees),
• Management of beehives during different seasons, and
• Handling and collection of honey and of beeswax.
• Keeping beehives in crop fields during flowering period increases pollination efficiency and improves the yield.

4) Fisheries:

• The fishery is an industry devoted to the catching, processing or selling of fish, shellfish or other aquatic animals. Freshwater fishes – Catla, Rohu and common crab;  Marine fishes – Hilsa, Sardines, mackerel, and Pomfrets.
• In order to meet the increasing demands on fisheries, different techniques have been employed to increase production.
• Through aquaculture and pisciculture, we have been able to increase the production of aquatic plants and animals, both fresh-water and marine.