Where's the beef? Why is livestock overlooked
by public and private investors?
Some reasons suggested by ILRI@40 Addis Ababa event
participants
Compiled by Peter Ballantyne
20 January 2015

• In 2014, to mark four decades of international livestock
research, the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI)
held a series of events on the ways in which livestock research
advances food and nutritional security, economic well-being
and healthy lives.
• At the November 2014 Addis Ababa event, we asked
participants to suggest reasons why livestock is overlooked by
public and private investors
• This powerpoint gives a summary of the suggestions
mentioned by participants; it also presents a graphic ‘word
cloud’ summarizing what the participants suggested (using a
simple categorization of the responses).
• More on ILRI@40 events: news.ilri.org/category/ilri40
ILRI@40

Reasons for not investing in livestock
http://wordle.net

Reasons not to invest
• Livestock investments are risky
– livestock are subject to droughts, export bans, policy biases, lack of
technology, difficult access to markets, un-developed market structures
not developed, and lack of longer term planning; livestock products are
perishable.
– high risk and long term investment is required before seeing returns (is
there evidence of returns on investment?); there are perceived risks to
humans and to livestock themselves
– livestock are a high risk investment with low returns (to private sector)
– higher risks associated to livestock investment [than crops]
– animals are more risky and solutions are more difficult and expensive
– livestock are a high risk venture; environmental pressures; production
cycles are slow; management intensive; no quick wins; disease pressure
leads to uncertainty; lack of technology; issues of scale and expansion;
land rights, capital requirements
– there are less partners to invest in

Reasons not to invest
• Livestock investors must overcome complexity
– compared to other interventions, it is difficult to get involved in livestock
- it requires transportation, infrastructure, specialized technologies.
– livestock value chains are complex
– livestock are management-intensive and labour-intensive
– mixed crop-livestock systems are complex

Reasons not to invest
• Livestock investments need time to mature
– livestock have a longer lag time for return on investments
– livestock programs require money and time to get results; evaluators
expect instant results
– it takes a long time and high investments to get results given all the
uncertainties with livestock production
– a long time is needed to deliver at a time when most investors want
'instant impact'
– it takes longer to realize returns to livestock investments; the impacts of
livestock are not immediate
– investment is held back by short termism of donors
– crops produce direct and visible benefits; livestock require long term
efforts (you don’t see benefits quickly)

Reasons not to invest
• Livestock investors have a limited evidence base
– the benefits of improved livestock production are less obvious
– few proofs of concept
– inadequate empirical evidence on the contributions of livestock to inform
public and private decision making
– limited evidence, little long term data and information [to convince
investors]
– perceived low returns on investments
– the links between livestock and development and food security are not
well-understood
– past World Bank programs indicate low returns on investment

Reasons not to invest
• Livestock are often invisible
– much livestock is produced in the informal sector [outside what investors
may see]
– livestock are taken for granted - they are always there - and are
overlooked in favour of other issues
– livestock are taken for granted - "because it moves it will take care of
itself"
– impacts of public goods investment in livestock are not easily visible and
take time to materialize
– livestock is rarely seen as a business, most usually just an aspect of the
landscape
– livestock keepers have no political voice because they are marginalized
– most people don’t pay attention to livestock
– history of policy neglect in most countries

Reasons not to invest
• Livestock have image problems
– simply, bad reputation
– people see a contradiction between feeding animals versus human nutrition.
Where land is scarce, people perceive it is needed for people over animals
– the 'bads' of livestock dominate public opinion because promoters are very vocal
– donors see livestock as bad for the environment
– in developed countries, there are negative associations such as public health and
environment. Not politically 'sexy'
– pressure from lobby groups who discourage people from eating animal products,
mainly for health reasons; a strong vegetarian/vegan lobby
– livestock often seen as a sign of [private] wealth; beef is expensive hence
consumed by a few rich [it does not deserve development investments]
– livestock raising is considered as a subsistence activity rather than an economic
venture
– supporters of livestock development do not have hard countervailing evidence;
they have been slow to counter negative publicity
– people think beef comes from the grocery store

Reasons not to invest
• Crop investments are more popular
– crop breeding is easy
– in developing countries fear of famine means priority is to staple crops
– the food price crisis was largely a staple crops affair
– when talking food security, crops dominate the conversations
– food security tends to equal cereal security - not looking at livestock for
this
– crop sector more attractive to investors due to shorter growth cycles
(return on investment)
– there’s a bias towards the colour green

More
• News stories: news.ilri.org/category/ilri40
• Products: cgspace.cgiar.org/handle/10568/45939
• Photos: Photos on flickr
• Video materials: Playlist on YouTube

The presentation has a Creative Commons license. You are free to re-use or distribute this work, provided credit is given to ILRI.
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