Costs and returns of the crop-cattle system in the Western Province of Zambia

The Western Province (WP) of Zambia covers an area of 122,000 km2 (13) and is divided into six districts. There are over half a million heads of cattle (10) of the Barotse breed, a Sanga breed type (11). They graze on natural pastures for about nine hours daily. At night the herds are kraaled on fields which will be cultivated at a later date. There are four grazing management systems (GMS): two transhumance and two sedentary systems (figure 1). The transhumance is over short distances (up to 40 km) when compared to that found in, for example, the Sahelian region, and occurs because people and cattle are forced to move out of the plains, when flooded in the wet season (GMS-1), or because they are forced to move to the flood plains because of lack of water in the uplands in the dry season (GMS-2) (1).


s INTRODUCTION
The Western Province (WP) of Zambia covers an area of 122,000 km 2 (13) and is divided into six districts. There are over half a million heads of cattle (10) of the Barotse breed, a Sanga breed type (11). They graze on natural pastures for about nine hours daily. At night the herds are kraaled on fields which will be cultivated at a later date. There are four grazing management systems (GMS): two transhumance and two sedentary systems (figure 1). The transhumance is over short distances (up to 40 km) when compared to that found in, for example, the Sahelian region, and occurs because people and cattle are forced to move out of the plains, when flooded in the wet season (GMS-1), or because they are forced to move to the flood plains because of lack of water in the uplands in the dry season (GMS-2) (1).
In many sub-Saharan countries, the provision of veterinary services has been free of charge for livestock owners (12). Meeting the costs involved in the provision of these services has become increasingly difficult for most governments (8). There is a need to rigorously restructure services through involvement of the private sector as well as the design of cost recovery measures. In the WP, the Department of Veterinary and Tsetse Control Services (DVTCS) is investigating the possibilities and requirements to restructure services (9). Research activities have been initiated in order to establish the position and economic importance of cattle in the rural society (22), of which the present study is one.
The study has three objectives: to assess 1) the economical and financial costs and returns (C&R) of cattle; 2) the various C&R among households; 3) the relative importance of cattle in relation to other farm and off-farm income.

s MATERIALS AND METHODS
The unit of investigation was the herd: a group of cattle belonging to one or more owners kept in one cattle pen or kraal under the responsibility of a kraal keeper (KK). The KK makes decisions for the whole herd but does not own all the animals.
The assessment was confined to economic and financial C&R. Social C&R, such as position in society, family relations and bride prices, were not considered. The kraal keeper's household (KKH) was defined as the KK and his wife or wives together with children and dependents such as parents, grandchildren etc., but excluded children living elsewhere. All others with cattle in the kraal, whether living in the village of the KK or not, were considered as the other owners.
From 1985 to 1988, the DVTCS has been monitoring 50 herds which were selected on the following characteristics: easy accessibility to enable data collection every two weeks; equal representation of transhumant and sedentary herds, as this is the normal situation in the WP according to the cattle census (10); and normal situation in the WP according to the cattle census (10); and a herd size between 20 and 120 animals to avoid exceptionally small or large herds (6). The distribution of the herds in the four main cattle-keeping districts of the WP was: Kalabo 12, Mongu 12, Senanga 17 and Sesheke 9. The distribution in the GMSs was: GMS-1 18; GMS-2 7; GMS-3 14; GMS-4 11.
Production parameters from these herds (from April 1986 to April 1988) and follow-up data, collected through a questionnaire survey among the same herds, were used for the economic assessment. The additional data gathered through the questionnaire related to the price, cost and income of ploughing, transport, milk production, livestock sales, local (emergency) slaughter and manure use. Moreover, data on income from crops and other farm and off-farm activities were collected. If a particular herd had more than one KK, only one of them was interviewed in full. However, a11 the KKs (55) of the 50 kraals studied were questioned about the household composition and areas cultivated. The kraal size, the area manured through shifting the kraal and the area ploughed were measured.
W RESULTS

General profile
Seventy-six percent of the informants considered themselves Lozi, the major tribe, but in fact the majority belonged to Lozi subtribes. The pure Lozis accounted for 20 %. The youngest KK was The economic returns of ploughing were based on 1) the amount of cultivated land, 2) labour requirements and 3) yields per ha, obtained by ploughing as compared with hand-hoeing. The following data were used in the calculations: 1) farms using animal traction cultivated 100 % more land than farms using handhoes (6.6 ha VCYSUS 3.3 ha) (19) (based on a survey considering 48 studies in ten sub-Saharan countries including Zambia); 2) an average of 86 working days per ha were required from handhoeing to harvesting, as against 68 working days from ploughing by oxen to harvesting (2); 3) data on basic yields of crops were taken from statistics for 1982-1987 collected by the Department of Agriculture in the WP. The yields per ha of maize, sorghum and millet were boosted by 8 %, and rice by 20 %, compared with yields from manually tilled fields (17). The reduction of labour requirements per ha on ox-ploughing farms was offset by the greater acreage (table III). This resulted in an increased labour requirement of 225 days. Oxen were hired out on only 5 % of the ploughing days, mostly for free, and rarely at the "normal" rate of US$2.5 to 3.75 per day.
The average return of ploughing over hoeing per 100 cattle was US$ 435, calculated at $ 519 for the increased acreage being tilled and higher yields per ha being produced, minus $ 84 for the extra labour.

Transport
Sixty-five percent of the 50 days that oxen per herd of 100 cattle were harnessed for transport were spent moving firewood while 25 % were spent transporting foodstuffs to and from the fields or markets. Other transported commodities were luggage, poles for houses or kraals, water, grass and people. Sledges were mostly used for transport.
The average number of oxen used per team for transport was four. Ox-teams were hired out in the same way as for ploughing. Since only 13 out of 50 kraals had occasionally hired out oxen, the opportunity cost of transport was low and assessed at $ 1.25 per transport day (based on $ 0.75 for labour of two persons and $ 0.5 for hiring of equipment), or $ 62 per year per herd of 100 cattle (table IV).

Manure
At night most cattle were kraaled for an average period of 11 months on fallow fields which were destined for cropping the next season. The kraal was usually made from local poles, occasionally thorn bushes and/or barbed wire. The barbed wire had been provided free of charge in the past. The cattle density during kraaling, including young-stock, was 0.6 animals per m 2 (SD = 0.44). How often the kraal was re-sited depended on the soil type and season. On average, kraals were shifted every three days in the rainy season and every five days in the dry season, leading to an average manured area of 1.08 ha (SD = 0.62) per 100 cattle (table II). Excluding herds which were not kraaled for the purpose of manuring the field, the average area manured per 100 cattle per year was 1.22 ha. Once a field had been manured, the kraal was re-sited there after a period of 3.3 years (SD = 1.5).
The effect of manure on the sandy soils was to increase yields of cassava, millet and sorghum by 60 % and those of other crops by 70 % in the first season after manuring. The residual effect of manure on crop yields in the second season after application was 40 % compared with yields from fields without manure application (17). The total average value for increased crop yields was calculated as $ 84 in the first year after the field had been manured and $ 35 for the second year.

Milk
The average price of one litre of milk was $ 0.10. The highest price was charged in Mongu District ($ 0.13), followed by Sesheke District ($ 0.11) and Senanga and Kalabo Districts ($ 0.09). Bessell and Daplyn (3) and the herd monitoring programme in the WP (6) estimated a milk production, both sold and self-consumed, of on average 122 and 211 litres per cow per year, respectively. The average of these two figures, 167 litres per cow per year, was used. The output was calculated as: Nbr. of adult cows present x calving rate x 0.5-1 abortion rate x price x 167 and amounted to $ 341 per year per 100 cattle.

Herd increase and meat production
The herd increase was calculated as: Births + purchases -sales -slaughters -deaths and amounted to 7.0 animals, sales to 6.4, purchases to 2.9 and local (emergency) slaughter to 7.8 animals per average herd of 100 cattle per year (table V). Slaughter was calculated as "slaughter + 0.614 deaths" because most animals that had died were consumed. The average price of purchased cattle ($ 39) was much lower than that of sold cattle ($ 86) because purchases often concerned young stock. The average value of a locally slaughtered animal was $ 24. The herd increase was calculated by using the average value of $ 58 per animal.

Hides
Only 45 % of the hides of the animals that had been slaughtered or had died (

Capital
The capital consisted mainly of cattle and of some draught-power implements such as ploughs and sledges. Capital cost was calculated on the basis of the real interest at 5 %. Depreciation for implements was set at 20 %. The average value of the animal inventory was calculated by using $ 86 per animal of 3 years and over (selling price), $ 39 per animal aged 2 to 3 years (buying price) and $ 12.5 per calf. The total value amounted to $ 5,766 with a cost of $ 289 for real interest, which is the interest forgone for having money capital tied in the animal. Other costs were of minor importance (table IV).

C&R per grazing management system
For the costs, the four GMSs were rather similar (table IV). In Sesheke District (GMS-2) manuring of fields was less common: only three out of nine interviewees mentioned manuring of fields by their herds. In the transhumant systems (GMS-1 and 2) a higher Values with different superscripts in row differ significantly (ANOVA; P < 0.05).
output for milk was realized, mainly because of higher milk prices. In GMS-4, the output of ploughing was less compared to the other GMSs. The low output of herd increase in GMS-4 was explained (and compensated) by higher cattle sales.

Distribution of C&R to the kraal keepers' household
The distribution of C&R to the KKH is summarized in table VI. This should be seen against the ownership of cattle which was 60 % for the KKH. Some of the milk accruing to the KKH (25 %) and most of the meat (75 %) were sold by the KKH.

Other income
The results of this paragraph are per KKH.

General profile
The tribal composition of the KKs interviewed indicated that 20 % were Lozi, which are the traditional cattle keepers. This agreed with the findings of a previous study (14).
The population census (20) showed an average number of 1.1 wives per married man in the rural areas of the WP, against 1.4 found among KKs in our study. Similarly, the KKH (10.2) was larger than the provincial average (4.7). Possibly, labour requirements and/or surplus of food attracted dependents who were taken up in the household.

Costs and returns Ploughing
The economic returns of ploughing were based on the amount of cultivated land, labour requirements and yields per ha obtained by ploughing as compared with hand-hoeing. This concept was used Revue Élev. Méd. vét. Pays trop., 1996, 49 (3) : 243-251 Table V Average herd structure and productivity parameters per grazing management system (GMS)

GMS-1 GMS-2 GMS-3 GMS-4 Av/tot
Area ( instead of the concept of "opportunity cost", because the latter was found inappropriate due to the absence of a free market caused by many social obligations and restrictions in hiring out of oxen for ploughing during the time of field preparation. Data from an animal draught-power survey in Senanga District of the WP (18) estimated an average cultivated area of 5.0 ha (4.2 ha ploughed) for households owning oxen against an average area of 3.0 ha for households without oxen. This implies a smaller effect in area expansion compared to the conclusions from Pingali et al. (19) which were applied in our study. The animal draughtpower survey (18) indicated a difference of 20 days from handhoeing to harvesting compared to ploughing by oxen to harvesting which is similar to the data of Barrett et al. (2) which were used in this study.
People in the study area, including some who owned oxen, generally complained of a shortage of draught-oxen. However, there are more than 46 days per average herd of 66 animals on which ploughing is possible in the WP (16) and ploughing can be increased to about 5 h per day (21). It can be concluded that oxen ploughed fewer fields than they potentially could and, consequently, there is room to increase the output of draughtpower. Reasons for the under-employment of oxen were related to an uneven distribution of oxen, both socially and topographically, the poor quantity and quality of fodder, shortage of cash and absentee ownership.

Manure
The conventional way to assess the economic returns of manure is to convert it into nutrient equivalents of fertilizer. In the WP  (17). These high applications can be used more efficiently if a larger area is manured annually because application of high rates of cattle manure can give rise to leaching of organic carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus, and it is more efficient to apply small amounts of manure frequently than large amounts at longer intervals (5).
Although manure is commonly considered to be one of the main products of cattle-keeping in the WP, it is not in general used fully. The main reasons for not using manure were a shortage of labour, lack of interest or because nearby fields were in cultivation. Even in areas where manuring was common it played a minor role (5 %) in terms of gross returns, because only a limited area was manured annually, and the resultant value of crops was low. This agrees with the results of an economic study on fertilizer equivalents which found that the contribution of manure to the kraal income was low (10 %) (15). However, farmers considered reducing the risk of crop failure as an important reason for the application of manure to be essential. In Sesheke District (GMS-2) manure was used less than in other districts, possibly because the district has more shifting cultivation, is drier, and maize is less common.

Herd increase and meat production
Outbreaks of disease in 1986 in the Southern Province (East Coast fever, foot and mouth disease) led to restrictions of cattle movement. Many private traders from the Southern Province shifted their trade to the WP. Therefore, the sales recorded in this report were higher than in previous years, especially in GMS-4. However, from 1987 to 1992 cattle sales remained at this higher level, a trend which is likely to continue. Despite this increase, the sale of cattle (6.4 % of the animals) was low and there is room to increase it, especially since the natural increase of the herd is large. If culling was more timely, the number of animals for emergency slaughter could be reduced as well. A higher offtake would require farmers to have improved marketing channels and good prices. In return, this could result in a higher income for the rural population and a larger meat supply of the local market.
The gross returns in the form of protein production, i.e. cattle sales, local slaughter and milk together, formed 53 % of the total gross returns.

Cost of land and labour
No land cost has been considered in this study since there is no individual land ownership and all land with good soils for crop cultivation is allocated by the chiefs. The opportunity cost of labour was determined at $ 0.38 per day. A study of households growing cassava and maize in Kaoma District also found a gross margin of $ 0.38 per labour day (4). and 85 %, though actual consumption was only 62 and 47 % of the kraal production. Meat consumption by the KKH was low because meat usually became available after an emergency slaughter and most was then sold. Slaughter for social purposes was uncommon in village life. Milk gradually became available in small quantities every day. Milk surpluses only occurred in the wet season and scarcely, if at all, in the long dry spell. Moreover, the KK who was also responsible for keeping someone else's cow was often rewarded in milk. Consequently, milk from cows owned by people not living near the kraal was often consumed by the KKH or partly sold. The share of the KKH in the net return at 58 % was similar to the distribution of ownership of cattle (60 %).

Other income
Cattle made a sizeable contribution (50 %) to the total income of the KKH. In terms of cash, the direct contribution of cattle was much less: $ 173 or 37 %. This is because most expenses incurred on cattle are paid in full by the KK. On the other hand, cash from crop sales, partly as a result of the use of animal draught-power and manure, was not credited to cattle. Furthermore, the labour costs were calculated at $ 0.38 per day but in actual fact amounted to much less, since herdsmen were partly paid in kind. Consequently, the cash contribution of cattle was much greater than the results of this study would suggest.

Provincial output
The total provincial net return was $ 8,479,000 per year. The assessed net income was $ 1.4/ha/yr and is lower than the income from extensive grazing of $ 2.4/ha/yr as found in East Africa (7). This is probably due to the low stocking rates found in the WP (1).

s CONCLUSION
Gathering economic information on cattle kraal management to augment technical production data obtained by the monitoring programme provided an interesting and quantitative insight into the multi-functional contribution of cattle in providing draughtpower, cash, milk and meat. The role of cattle as providers of manure appeared minor in economic terms. The study also indicated that there is room to increase draught-power and offtake of the herd. The study further led to the conclusion that cash income from cattle husbandry provided a major part of the total income of the KKH and that the C&R were related to ownership of cattle.