ASSESSMENT OF EFFICIENCY AND MAJOR CONSTRAINTS OF ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION SERVICE IN SELECTED DISTRICTS OF WEST WALLAGA ZONE, OROMIA REGION, ETHIOPIA

Abstract

This study aimed to assess the efficiency of the artificial insemination service and its major constraints from December 2022 to January 2024 in the three selected districts of West Wallaga Zone, Oromia Region, Ethiopia. The study was conducted using both cross-sectional and retrospective study designs with multi-stage sampling techniques. A cross-sectional study was employed via structured questionnaires to collect data from 246 respondents (201 AI beneficiaries, 9 AITs, and 36 AHPs). Moreover, the retrospective study was conducted using the recorded data of AI services covering the years 2019 to 2022 at animal health clinics of respective districts. Data analysis was carried out by the JMP pro.17 version software package, and this study showed that of 201 dairy cattle owners, only 51(25.37%) respondents get regular AI services and are satisfied with the overall services, while the majority 150 (74.63%) do not get regular AI services due to shortage of AI inputs (42%), shortage of AI technicians (36.67%), and unavailability of services on weekends and holidays (21.33%), which shows statistically significant differences (P-value = 0.0405) among districts. Of the total dairy cattle owners who are not receiving AI services regularly, 39.33% use natural mating, and the rest (60.67%) postpone the time of insemination for the next heat cycle when the AI service is not available. The identified most common challenges of AI services were conception failure (21.43%), lack of AI services in the vicinity (18.13%), heat detection problems (17%), shortage of AI technicians (16.5%), poor awareness creation of the farmers (12.64%), shortage of AI service inputs (7.7%), and insufficient support from the concerned bodies (6.6%) that shows no statistically significant differences (X2 = 9.448; p-value = 0.8844) among the three selected districts. The reproductive performance of dairy cows were AFS (45.38±0.16, and 32.09±0.26 months), AFC (54.87±0.18, and 41.56±0.26 months), DO (197.11±2.13, and 143.64±3.03 days), CI (16.03±0.07, and 14.25±0.1 months), and NSPC (2.08±0.05, and 1.92±0.07 times) for local, and crossbreed cows respectively and these reproductive performances were affected by feed shortage (34.82%), diseases (22.39%), poor reproductive performance of local cows (21.89%), and overall poor management of cows (20.9%). In the record study, conceivability and delivery of the artificially inseminated cows have fluctuated among the selected years and for this reason, inadequate breeding management and cow-related issues have a significant contribution. In the study area, the majority (74.63%) of dairy cattle owners were not satisfied with AI services, and the service is not doing well in all selected districts due to several constraints raised above. Therefore, immediate action is required to solve the problems associated with AI services through all responsible bodies including all governmental and non-governmental organizations to increase the productive and reproductive performance of dairy cattle, especially indigenous cows in terms of genetic improvement to achieve maximum benefit from this reproductive biotechnology.