Techno-Economic Factors Affecting Genetic Investment in Dairy Cattle in Egypt

Vertical expansion in Egyptian livestock is the only feasible approach for development, particularly, milk production. This is due to lack of natural range, enough feed supply and competition between food production and feed production in using the very limited water resources supply and irrigated agricultural land in Egypt. In addition, Egypt has a comparative advantage in milk production. However, the milk yield of the domestic cattle is still much below the world average. Vertical expansion means to raise the productivity, via genetic investment. The study used a field sample survey data to apply a designed mathematical investment flow model up to fifth calving of the dam's daughter, to test the impact of a set of technical and economic factors on the predicted economic rate of return (ERR) of the genetic improvement via an artificial insemination (A.I) program of the domestic dairy cattle. The results showed that (ERR) at the most probable level of both economic and productive variables was 23.3%, when A.I. of a sire's semen with PDM around 865 Kg of mill was applied, which was much higher than the average interest rate in Egyptian market (14%) and the inflation rate in milk price (11%). If the genetic improvement faced 10% increase in the number of services for conception, age at first calving and calving interval, the ERR decreased by 6%. An increase in the feed costs by 10% regressed the ERR by 7%. A 10% increase in the number of service for conception, age at first calving and the calving interval decreased the ERR by 3.1%, 2% and 1.1%, respectively. Such model is suitable for assessment of the feasibility of genetic improvement programs in developing countries