VIRTUAL CAMPUS

Objective

Like all economic activities, livestock production is a source of greenhouse gases (GHG) that contribute to global warming. Of the GHGs produced by livestock production, methane from enteric fermentation in ruminants is the most important, accounting for about 30 % of total global methane emissions.

Several methane mitigation strategies are currently under intense research. Genetic selection is one of the most promising tools based on the existing genetic diversity in ruminants. Genetic improvement to reduce methane emissions is based on identifying and breeding cattle with low methane emissions. This strategy could be easily integrated into routine farm management, is cost effective and provides long-term results. However, this type of breeding programme is difficult to implement. Identifying low-emitting cows requires measuring methane from a large number of individuals on different farms using expensive and complex equipment; developing, standardising and curating large data sets; creating genetic models to estimate breeding values for methane traits; and practically incorporating these new traits into a breeding programme on a national scale.

Some countries have already started to record individual methane emissions from cows, but there is a lot of room for improvement. Furthermore, as global warming is a planetary issue, it is necessary that more countries include methane in their cattle breeding programmes in order to have a meaningful international response to this issue. In this context, the aim of the course is to teach the process required to include methane as a trait in breeding programmes.

At the end of the course, participants will:

·         know the advantages and disadvantages of different methane measuring devices on farm;

·         understand how to screen and manipulate raw dataset provided by methane measuring devices;

·         be able to create genetic models and estimate genetic parameters for methane traits;

·         be aware of different proxies to estimate methane emissions;

·         understand the concept of breeding programmes and how to implement methane traits;

·         know about different breeding programmes implementing methane traits;