The history of reproductive biotechnologies in buffalo breeding in Colombia

Cattle industry has taken on the responsibility of producing food for the millions of humans living on the planet. This food, in the form of meat and milk, must meet minimum requirements: produce sufficient quantities to meet the needs of people and provide the required quality standards to fulfill its nutritional function. Farmers and ranchers should improve the food of animals, increase the number of animals per unit area, care for health conditions, and use reproduction as an aspect of production. To this end, reproductive biotechnologies have been developed by combining advances in genetics, cell biology, and biophysics in order to intervene the fundamental fact of the permanence of living beings in nature: reproduction. This articlewill review the use of these technologies in an animal species: buffaloes, which is working to improve the first requirement and struggles to meet the second one: meat and milk of excellent nutritional value.