International genetic evaluation: a questionnaire to assess the willingness of sheep and goat breeders and organisations in participating in a future routine evaluation

– by J.M. Astruc

Work package 6 is dedicated to the development and implementation of practical selection tools to achieve the overarching objective of SMARTER (develop novel and collaborative strategies to improve the resilience and efficiency of the sheep and goat sectors), especially through harmonisation and international cooperation. In order to propose an organisation and business model for a future across country genetic evaluation, a questionnaire has been distributed in early September:

• to assess the willingness of the countries and breeds to participate in the future in routine runs,
• to have an overview of the expectations and concerns that such evaluations should raise,
• to know which breeds would be interested.

This questionnaire, organised by ICAR and the WP6 partners, targets the breeders and organisations of the SMARTER countries, as well as the members of the stakeholders’ platform. It is multi-lingual (English, Spanish, French, Italian, German) in order to have a wider participation. Through a large panel of respondents, we aim at having the vision of various stakeholders to strengthen the partners’ perspective. The results will be shared with WP7. A first synthesis of the results will be presented during the virtual meeting organised remotely in October.