Livestock research and environmental sustainability with special reference to the Mediterranean basin

The request for this paper was set to provide a perspective on small ruminant productivity with the emphasis being on production in harmony with the environment and disease control. The topic is relevant and important, since it poses a serious challenge to our Mediterranean region's animal scientists in view of public perception with reference to animal production systems. Whilst there is reason to believe that science and technology could cope with the short and medium term negative environmental effects of animal production systems, the most serious environmental costs from animal agriculture are probably incurred over time scales too long to perceive and respond to effectively. Scientific advances and the present methods of technology for food production, preservation, processing, transport and marketing are forcing rapid change, particularly throughout the less developed and marginal regions of the world. Only time will show whether the present pace of change will, on balance, have an overall positive or negative effect on the future state of affairs. These changes should be managed to prevent devastating effects not only on traditional animal agriculture but also on the environment as a whole allowing for a planned evolutionary process, so that humans and the livestock they care for can adopt the new socio-economic conditions, they both must face. Livestock-related development projects in our region must be integrated in a healthy and dynamic rural context. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.