Nigeria currently has a livestock population of about 16.3 million cattle, 40.8 million goats, and 27 million sheep.
Dr. Lami Lombin, Executive Director, National Vetelinary Research Institute, Jos, disclosed this at a conference in Abuja. In a paper presented at the conference, she said that Nigeria also has about 151 million poultry, 3.5 million pigs, 900,000 donkeys and 90,000 camels.
“Livestock and poultry production are the main economic activities of about 70 per cent of Nigerians living in the rural and urban areas,” she said, in her paper, entitled, “Livestock Vaccination in Nigeria: The Role of Local Government Areas.”
The director said that limiting factors to livestock production included poor feeds, lack of grazing areas, disease, poor management practices and poor financial base.
“After feed, disease is the second most limiting factor in livestock production and the principal cause of low performance in the livestock sector,” she said.
She stressed that some common livestock diseases in Nigeria included African swine fever for large animals, and Influenza for poultry.
According to her, economic losses due to these diseases run into millions of naira, adding that in 1987, estimate of losses “was put at N12 million ($100,000)."
On the role of local government councils in the breeding of livestock, Lombin said they were expected to assist farmers by subsidising costs of feed, cost of medication and the provision of animal health facilities.
The Tide
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