Application, Socio-economic Feasibility of Hydroponic Fodders and Nutrient Utilization in the Nigerian Livestock Industry: A Review

Abstract

Hydroponic fodders produced from readily available grains are highly nutritious, and contain more nutrients than most conventional fodders, dry feeds, or grains, especially in their carbohydrate, protein, mineral, and vitamin contents. Sorghum and millet hydroponic fodders may however contain significant levels of antinutrients such as cyanide, phytin and tannins which may be harmful to livestock. Varying levels of hydroponic fodders have been used to replace concentrates in the diets of ruminants, monogastric, and rabbits with promising improvements in growth performance, feed efficiency and cost of production. Hydroponics fodder production practice has been applied to urban and peri-urban livestock farming constrained by limited rangelands for forage production, and labour costs. There is also research evidence of potentials for hydroponic fodder system to reduce land and water usage and greenhouse (GHG) emissions from fodder production, thus, providing better carbon sequestration opportunities than the conventional farming approach, and therefore contributing to climate change mitigation objectives. Sustainable forage production technologies such as the hydroponic fodder system could minimize the adverse impacts of climate change and conflicts in vulnerable livestock producing zones. Specifically, livestock production in drought prone zones of Nigeria could be sustained through the use of the fresh green fodders produced from the hydroponic units in addition to the improvements in their livestock performance. The socioeconomic feasibility of the hydroponic fodder production system across the different animal production realities at the various locations such as seasonal availability of feedstuff, abundance of year round natural fodder, traditional practices, disease prevalence and local policy constraints will however be considered before the introduction of the technology. Training and supply of capital inputs on hydroponic fodder production could be applied by appropriate government agencies as livelihood empowerment programme for low-income farmers, unemployed youths and women at different locations in the country. There is however the need to explore the feasibility of commercial hydroponic fodder production among pastoralists, and urban farmers and at the traditional and non-traditional livestock production locations in Nigeria.