Multidimensional crop improvement to increase overall productivity in mixed crop-livestock systems and to support intensification of

livestockMichael Blümmel, Purvi Mehta and Iain A. Wright

Norman Borlaug Centenary Dialogue, Chennai, India 13-15 March 2014

Topics

2

Importance of crop residues as feed resource:

contribution, demand, monetary value

What differences/quality increments in crop residue fodder quality matter, and why

Exploitable variation in fodder traits in existingcultivars

Targeted genetic enhancement in fodder traits

Feed and intensification of dairy production

Dual-purpose crops: demand, value and exploiting existing

variations

3

4

Key feed sources in India: 2003and 2020

Feed Resource %

Crop ResiduesPlanted fodder crops

2003 2020

44.2 69.0 34.1 ?

Greens (F/F/CPR/WL) 17.8 <10

Concentrates 3.9 7.3

(summarized from NIANP, 2005 and Ramachandra et al., 2007)

Sorghum stover trading in Hyderabad

5

Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Ju Jul Aug Sep Oc Nov0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

Sorghum grain

Sorghum stover

3.4

6.5

Month of trading

Ind

ian

Ru

pee

per

kg

Yearly mean

2004 to 2005

Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Ju Jul Aug Sep Oc Nov0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

Sorghum stoverSorghum grain

6.2

10.2

Yearly mean

2008 to 2009

Month of trading

Comparisions of average cost of dry sorghum stover traded in Hyderabad and average of cost ofsorghum grain in Andhra Pradesh 2005 to 2005 and 2008 to 2009

Changes in grain: stover value in sorghum traded in Hyderabad from 2004 to 2009

Type and cost of sorghum stover traded monthly 2004-2005 in Hyderabad, India

Stover type Price IR / kg DM

Andhra 3.52b

Andhra Hybrid 3.15cd

Ballary Hybrid 3.54b

Raichur 3.89a

Rayalaseema 3.23c

Telangana (Local Y) 3.06d

7Blümmel and Parthasarathy, 2006

Relation between digestibility and price of sorghum stover

44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 552.8

3.0

3.2

3.4

3.6

3.8

4.0

4.2y = -4.9 + 0.17x; R2 = 0.75; P = 0.03

Stover in vitro digestibility (%)

Sto

ver

pri

ce (

IR/k

g D

M)

Premium Stover“Raichur”

Low Cost Stover“Local Yellow”

Blümmel and Parthasarathy, 2006

9

Large scale rice strawtrading in Bihar, India

Chopping and retailing ofrice straw in Bihar, India

Price: quality relation estimates in rice straw traded monthly in Kolkata from 2008 to 2009

37.0 37.5 38.0 38.5 39.0 39.5 40.0 40.5 41.0 41.5 42.02.75

3.00

3.25

3.50

3.75

4.00

4.25

Best (n=81)

Good (n=260)

Medium/low (n=273)

In vitro digestibility of rice straw (%)

Pri

ce o

f ri

ce s

traw

at

Ko

lkat

a tr

ader

sfr

om

200

8-20

09 (

Ind

ian

Ru

pee

s/kg

)

Teufel et al., 2010

Ingredients %

Sorghum stover 50

Bran/husks/hulls 18

Oilcakes 18

Molasses 8

Grains 4

Minerals, vitamins, urea 2

Feed block manufacturing: supplementation, densification

Courtesy: Miracle Fodder and Feeds PVT LTD

Comparisons of higher and lower quality sorghum stover based complete feed blocks in dairy buffalo

Block High(52% dig)

Block Low(47% dig)

CP 17.2 % 17.1%

ME (MJ/kg) 8.46 MJ/kg 7.37 MJ/kg

DMI 19.7 kg/d 18.0 kg/d

DMI per kg LW 3.6 % 3.3 %

Milk Potential 16.6 kg/d 11.8 kg/d

Anandan et al. (2009a)

Stover digestibility and grain yield in new sorghum cultivars release-tested in India between 2002 and 2008

34 37 40 43 46 49 52 55 58 61 640

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000

Kharif: y = 1473 + 44.2x; r = 0.17; P=0.05Rabi: y = 9208 -132x; r = -0.47; P < 0.0001

Stover in vitro organic digestibility (%)

Gra

in y

ield

(kg

/ha)

Blümmel et al. 2010

Straw in vitro organic matter digestibility and grain yield in 437 cultivars from IRRI

32.5 35.0 37.5 40.0 42.5 45.0 47.5 50.0 52.50

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000

8000

9000AROMATICSHYBRIDSINDICANPTReleased varieties

y = 10 650 - 103.7x; r= - 0.19 P=<0.0001

Straw in vitro organic matter digestibility (%)

Gra

in y

ield

(kg

/ha)

Source: Blümmel et al. 2007

Blümmel et al., unpublished

Blümmel et al., unpublished

Dual-purpose crops: targeted genetic enhancement

Response of stover in vitro digestibility to 2 cycles of selection

Digestibility %

Grain Yieldkg/ha

Stover yieldkg/ha

Original 43.6 2 669 3 095

H1 44.5 2 596 3 460

L1 42.1 2 592 2 889

H2 45.8 2 564 3 168

L2 42.0 2 408 2 731

Choudhary et al (in preparation )

Mode of inheritance of some key traits in pearl millet stover

Trait Parent Crosses

High Low H x H H x L L x L

N % 0.85 0.72 0.84 0.80 0.73

Digest. % 43.3 40.3 43.7 42.2 40.3

Choudhary et al (2010)

Berhanu et al 2013

Blümmel at al., unpublished

Effect of introgression of different stay green QTL’s on stover digestibity of a Rabi sorghum background

23

Qualitative trait prediction in plant breeding basedon Near Infrared Spectroscopy (NIRS)

Non-evasivec. 200 samples/d>30 traits

Physico-chemicalc. 60 000 US $CalibrationValidation

NIRS equations sharable across compatible instruments

At current: ILRI

Key findings: dual-purpose crops targeted genetic enhancement

Generally more expensive and longer term than exploiting variations in existing dual–purpose cultivars

Conventional plant breeding can increase for example digestibility by 3 to 5 percent units

Several trait improvements feasible for example stay green effects on fodder quality and water use efficiency

Need for more conceptually designed proof-of-concept research, for example to determine ceiling values

Key elements of intensification: relativity of

feed requirements and implications

Feed allocation, methane production and natural resource utilization

India: Livestock and milk in 2005-06Milch animals Total animals Milk yield

x 103 kg/d

Cross Bred 8 216 28 391 6.44

Local 28 370 155 805 1.97

Buffalo 33 137 101 253 4.40

Overall herd mean 3.61 l/d

Actual average across herd milk yields (3.61 kg/d) and scenario-dependent

ME requirements for total milk production (81.8 million t/y) in India in 2005

ME required (MJ x 109)

Milk (kg/d) Maintenance Production Total

3.61 (05/06) 1247.6 573.9 1821.5

6 (Scenario 1) 749.9 573.9 1323.8

9 (Scenario 2) 499.9 573.9 1073.8

12 (Scenario 3) 374.9 573.9 948.8

15 (Scenario 4) 299.9 573.9 873.9

Effect of increasing average daily milk yields onoverall methane emissions from dairy in India

0 3 6 9 12 150.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

Daily milk yield per animal (liter)

Met

han

e p

rod

uce

d (

Tg

)

current herd average milk yield of 3.61 l/d

(Blϋmmel et al. 2009)

(2005-06) 2020 2020 (fixed LP

Milk (million tons) 91.8 172 172

yield/day (kg) 3.6 5.24 6.76

Numbers (000) 69759 89920 * 69759

Metabolizable energy requirements (MJ x 109)

Maintenance 1247.64 1608.22 1247.6

Production 573.94 1075.00 1075.00

total 1821.58 2683.22 23266.6

Feed Req.( m tons) 247.50 364.57 315.6

* Calculated based on CAGR

Livestock revolution: Impact on energy and feed requirements

Findings: key elements of intensification

Important to realize that feed demand is context specific

Increasing per animal productivity and decreasing numbers of animals will have multiple beneficial effects

Reallocations of currently available feed resources in India could probably raise per animal productivity to

10 to 12 kg of milk per day

The presentation has a Creative Commons licence. You are free to re-use or distribute this work, provided credit is given to ILRI.

better lives through livestock

ilri.org