Indigenous Sex Sorted Semen And Unified Genomic Chip: Livestock Scheme
The Prime Minister of India launched two programs of the Animal Husbandry Department for the benefit of the livestock – ‘ Indigenous Sex Sorted Semen’ and ‘ Unified Genomic Chip’.
- Unified Genomic Chip is aimed at helping farmers identify high-quality cattle early and enhance dairy farming efficiency in India.
- The chip comes in two versions
- The ‘Gau Chip’ for cattle and the ‘Mahish Chip’ for buffalo.
- It is developed by the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying (DAHD), under the Ministry of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries.
- The purpose of this chip is to help farmers make informed decisions on animal selection by identifying young, high-quality bulls at an early age.
- The chip is tailored for Indian cattle breeds and will help improve the quality of cattle and enhance the dairy farming sector.
- Sex Sorted Semen is the ‘gender selected’ semen used by Artificial Insemination (AI) for cattle and buffaloes to produce more than 90% selected gender (females).
- It is very effective in breed improvement and till now it was manufactured by multinational companies.
- The National Dairy Development Board under the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying, has developed the indigenous technology of sex-sorted semen worth Rs. 250.
- IVF technology (commonly known as test tube baby technology) is also being used for this purpose.
- It has now planned to produce a minimum of 10 lakh sexed semen doses annually for the ongoing artificial insemination (AI) programme.
