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On this page, we will publish some of the results of our research as and when it becomes available….

LPP’s „Ark-project“ presented at IFOAM Conference on Organic Animal Husbandry

A paper about LPP’s „Ark of Biodiversity“ project that is supported by the Fondation d’Entreprise Hermes was presented during the IFOAM Conference on Organic Animal Husbandry held in Hamburg from 12-14th September. It clearly states that locally adapted breeds are the foundation for „green“ and ecological livestock development. The presentation is available here.

How does one make ghee?

Ghee – clarified butterfat – has enormous cultural, religious and nutritional importance and meaning in India. Among the desert communities of Rajasthan, offering ghee to guests is part of the hospitality ritual, and it would be extremely impolite to provide “luki” (dry) chapattis (unleavened bread) without ghee to a visitor. In temples, ghee is essential for rituals (puja), and ghee is also extremely important as a source of nutrition and energy, especially for pregnant and nursing mothers and for people recovering from illness. The ghee from indigenous cows is considered the best and most preferred, buffalo ghee is less popular.

Ghee making is a female chore. Here is a presentation by LPPS intern Gemma Julia about how women make Jaisalmer Ghee.

Why is Jaisalmeri meat famous?

“Jaisalmeri meat” – named after the famous caravan town in India’s Thar desert – is famous – we hear about it all the time. But why? Does it taste good, because it comes from a particular breed of goat, i.e. is genetic, or because of what the goat eats, i.e. is a question of feeding and the environment, or it is because of the way the meat is cooked? How do we disentangle these factors? And anyway, what is “taste”? Isn’t taste culturally conditioned, i.e. depending on what you ate as a child, or because we associate a certain dish with a particular area to which we are sentimentally attached?

Read what our team found out in this report about the The Ark of Livestock Biodiversity expedition

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Welcome to the Ark of Livestock Biodiversity

Join us as we track down the hidden values of the livestock breeds kept by pastoralists and other livestock keepers – breeds that are truly special because they

  • walk for miles in harsh terrain to seek out scattered, spiky, fibrous plants that survive in areas where crops could never be grown.
  • take droughts and hunger in their stride and act as insurance
  • are social animals in the true sense – living in a herd, responding to the voice of their keepers, and defending their young against predators.
  • are part and parcel of their respective eco-systems and provide a host of environmental services
  • produce delicious and healthy food as well as a range of other organic products

These breeds are the consolidated result of hundreds or even thousands years of purposeful breeding and of natural selection. They epitomize oodles of traditional knowledge and selection criteria that are important to pastoralists, but about which no animal scientist has ever dreamt, such as the urge to forage, being social, and the guts to survive droughts and other calamities.

Unfortunately, this type of sturdy livestock is threatened by extinction as the world is being taken over by livestock mono-cultures: poultry produced by two or three companies globally, white hybrid pigs, and genetically closely related Holstein Friesian cows.

This website is about our endeavours to create incentives and policy frameworks towards the survival and better utilization of these ecologically important breeds – animals that are the foundation for a more sustainable and greener approach to livestock production!

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