Socio-economic and technical evaluation of sheep and goat farms in north west coast of Egypt [electronic resource].

Includes references.

The main objective of this study was to analyze the socio-economic situation of small ruminant farms at mixed farming system of different farm sizes in North West Coast of Egypt (NWCE). Ninety eight sheep and goat farms under mixed farming system were randomlyselected. The selected farms were divided into three categories according to flock size holding; small ≤185 animals (49 farms), medium > 185 ≤ 383 animals (31farms) and large > 383 animals (18 farms). Questionnaire was designed and pre-tested on limited numbers of farms who have good experience in crops, sheep and goat production. Primary data were collected by interviewing selected farmers plus secondary data were used from the Economic Affairs Sectors belonging to the Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation. Results show that average cultivated areas are 58.66, 96.36 and 116.63 feddan for the three farm sizes, respectively. Five crops were commonly cultivated in the studied areas: barely and wheat as winter crops, watermelon as summer crop and two types of fig and olive trees. Average gross margin/animal/year for male sheep and goat were L.E. 478, 676 and 722 for sheep and 388, 452 and 403 for goat in small, medium and large farm sizes, respectively.

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