Exploring the Strategies for Climate Smart Livestock Production in India: Opportunities and Challenges

Addressing climate change on livestock and vice versa is challenging and multidimensional. Livestock sector is playing a key role in food security and nutritional security to the growing global population. Livestock sector in India is especially vulnerable to the climate change in terms of quantity and quality of livestock production. On the other hand, the livestock also poses detrimental effect on the environment through emission of Green House Gas emissions. Hence, there has been growing interest in studying the impact of livestock production on climate change and vice versa. This paper indicates that there is a need for interventions in micro-farm level technological, macro-farm level technological and institutional approaches for achieving sustainability in different livestock production system amid climate change. Further, the paper suggests that conservation and genetic improvement of indigenous livestock breeds, restructuring traditional livestock production systems and validating sustainable on-farm management innovations could make small holder livestock farmers resilient, amid climatic change variations.