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Economic efficiency is affected by several traits, and as the unit of selection is the individual, in artificial selection, to promote the maximization of economic genetic gain, the traits to be improved must be weighted by their respective economic values. In Brazil, breeding goals are defined empirically, and not based on an economic evaluation, therefore, the aim of this study was to estimate economic values for traits of economic importance in dairy farming systems based on the use of purebred and crossbred Guzerat animals. The economic values for 305-days milk yield (MY), fat yield (FY), protein yield (PY), and somatic cell count (SCC) were calculated for different production systems based on the feed management: System 1, based on pasture grazing with Brachiaria brizantha or Panicum maximum cv. Mombaça during rainy season, and corn-silage supplementation during the dry season; System 2, based on pasture grazing with Brachiaria brizantha or Panicum maximum cv. Mombaça during rainy season, and the mixture of sugarcane including urea supplementation during the dry season. Bioeconomic models were applied to estimate economic values, and a sensitivity analysis was performed. Four selection indexes were defined, each one with different goals: milk (I 1 ), milk + protein yield (I 2 ), I 2  + fat yield (I 3 ) and I 3  + somatic cell count (I 4 ). The economic values for MY and PY were positive for both production systems. However, for FY, the values were positive for System 2 but negative for System 1. The economic value for SCC was negative (-7.33 per SCS per lactation). The selection responses for I 1 were higher than those for I 2 , I 3 and I 4 , for both production systems. I 4 presented the highest expected genetic gain for each trait, except for fat yield, whose expected genetic gain was greater with the use of I 2 , in both production systems. The results indicates that the inclusion of milk quality traits in the selection index provides better economic return, and due to the small differences in expected genetic superiority, I 1 is still the most suitable for crossbred Guzerat herds whose main activity is milk production in Brazil., Competing Interests: Declarations. Ethics approval: Not applicable. Consent to participate: Consent was obtained from all authors. Consent for publication: All participants have consented to the submission of the review article to the journal. Conflict of interest: The authors declare no competing interests., (© 2025. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V.)

Our goal was to define a breeding objective for Brangus beef cattle in Brazil. Bioeconomic models were produced and used to estimate economic values (EVs). The scenarios simulated were typical full-cycle beef production systems that are used in tropical and subtropical regions. The breeding objective contained pregnancy rate (PR), warm carcass weight (WCW), mature cow weight (MCW), number of nematode eggs per gram of faeces (EPG) and tick count (TICK). Two models were used in series to estimate the EV. A deterministic model was used to simulate effects of PR, WCW and MCW on profitability with a constant parasite load. Subsequently, stochastic models were used to estimate economic values for TICK and EPG as consequences of their environmental effects on weight gains, mortality and health costs. The EV of PR, WCW, MCW, EPG and TICK, was US$1.59, US$2.11, -US$0.24, -US$5.35 and -US$20.88, respectively. Results indicate positive emphasis should be placed on PR (12.49%) and WCW (65.07%) with negative emphasis on MCW (13.92%), EPG (2.77%) and TICK (5.75%). In comparison with the indexes usually used, these results suggest a reformulation in the selection indexes of the beef production system in tropical and subtropical regions in order to obtain greater profitability., (© 2019 Blackwell Verlag GmbH.)

The social contribution of goat and sheep industries is very important to many Brazilian families mainly in semi-arid regions of the country. However, the productive chains of these two species in Brazil are unorganized and ultimately informal. On the other hand, there is potential for growth and development to which an upscaling of breeding programmes will be essential. Historically, many attempts to structure these programmes have been unsuccessful. Inadequate understanding of how to achieve genetic improvement often leading to distributing unsuitable exotic genetics among the producers is one of the reasons for the failure. Another important factor is related to the sources of funding and the priorities for the use of funds. According to the experience and the state of the art in Brazil, the priorities for funding must be in the characterization of the different systems and animal genetic resources, organization of information collection procedures and national databanks, training of technicians and producers and development of system to enable animal evaluation., (© 2019 Blackwell Verlag GmbH.)

This study aimed to calculate economic values (EVs) and economic selection indices for milk production systems in small rural properties. The traits 305-d milk yield in kg (MY), fat (FP) and protein (PP) percentage, daily fat (FY) and protein (PY) yield, cow live weight in kg (LW), calving interval (CI), and logarithm of daily somatic cell count (SCC) in milk were considered the goals and selection criteria. The production systems were identified from 29 commercial properties based on the inventory of revenues and costs and of zootechnical field data. Later, bioeconomic models were developed to calculate the productive performance, revenues, and costs concerning milk production to estimate EVs, which were calculated as the difference in annual profit with dairy production resulting from a change in one unit of the trait while keeping the others constant and dividing the value by the number of cows. After the EVs were known, ten economic selection indices were estimated for each system so they could be compared by modifying the selection criteria and calculating the relative importance of each selection criteria, the accuracy of the economic selection index, and response expected to the selection in USD, among other parameters. One of the systems detected was called less intensive (LS) and was characterized by having ten cows in lactation that produced 13·5 l/d and consumed 1·8 kg of concentrate/d. The second system detected was called more intensive (IS) and had 22 cows in lactation that produced 17·5 l/d and consumed 3·4 kg of concentrate/d. Monthly profits per cows in lactation of USD 2·60 and USD 68·77 were recorded for LS and IS, respectively. The EVs of the traits MY, FP, and PP were all positive, while for the other traits they were all negative in all situations. The best economic selection indices were those featuring selection criteria MY, LW, and CI, while the trait LW had the greatest importance in both systems. These results indicate that animal frame must be controlled in order to maximize the system's profit.

Genetic improvement of animals plays an important role in improving the economic and environmental sustainability of livestock production systems. This paper proposes a method to incorporate mitigation of environmental impacts and risk preferences of producers into a breeding objective via economic values (EVs). The paper assesses the effects of using these alternative EVs of breeding goal traits on discounted economic response to selection and on environmental impacts at commercial farm level. The application focuses on a Brazilian pig production system. Separate dam- and sire-line breeding programs that supply parents in a 3-tier production system for producing crossbreds (fattening pigs) at commercial level were assumed. Using EVs that are derived from utility functions by incorporating risk aversion increases the cumulative discounted economic response to selection in sire-line selection (6%) while reducing response in dam-line selection (12%) compared with the use of traditional EVs. The use of EVs that include environmental costs increases the cumulative discounted social response to selection in both dam-line (5%) and sire-line (10%) selections. Emission of greenhouse gases, and excretion of nitrogen and phosphorus can be reduced more with genetic improvements of production traits than reproduction traits for the typical Brazilian farrow-to-finish pig farm. Reductions in environmental impacts do not, however, depend on the use of the different EVs (i.e., with and without taking into account environmental costs and risk). Both environmental costs and risk preferences of producers need to be considered in sire-line selection, and only environmental costs in dam-line selection to improve, at the same time, the economic and environmental sustainability of the Brazilian pig production system.

The objective of this study was to determine the optimal number of repetitions to be used in competition trials of popcorn traits related to production and quality, including grain yield and expansion capacity. The experiments were conducted in 3 environments representative of the north and northwest regions of the State of Rio de Janeiro with 10 Brazilian genotypes of popcorn, consisting by 4 commercial hybrids (IAC 112, IAC 125, Zélia, and Jade), 4 improved varieties (BRS Ângela, UFVM-2 Barão de Viçosa, Beija-flor, and Viçosa) and 2 experimental populations (UNB2U-C3 and UNB2U-C4). The experimental design utilized was a randomized complete block design with 7 repetitions. The Bootstrap method was employed to obtain samples of all of the possible combinations within the 7 blocks. Subsequently, the confidence intervals of the parameters of interest were calculated for all simulated data sets. The optimal number of repetition for all of the traits was considered when all of the estimates of the parameters in question were encountered within the confidence interval. The estimates of the number of repetitions varied according to the parameter estimated, variable evaluated, and environment cultivated, ranging from 2 to 7. It is believed that only the expansion capacity traits in the Colégio Agrícola environment (for residual variance and coefficient of variation), and number of ears per plot, in the Itaocara environment (for coefficient of variation) needed 7 repetitions to fall within the confidence interval. Thus, for the 3 studies conducted, we can conclude that 6 repetitions are optimal for obtaining high experimental precision.

During the last 20 years, the national production of grains has increased 156.1%; productivity increased 93.8% and there has been an increase of 29.1% in cultivated area. Currently, agribusiness is responsible for 40% of Brazilian exports. Nevertheless, there is little quantitative information on the main plant species of economic interest that have been registered and protected in the Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Supply Ministry (MAPA) by public and private companies, as well as by public-private partnerships. Consequently, we investigated the registry and protection of 27 species of economic interest, including the 15 that are the basis of the Brazilian diet, based on the information available on the site CultivarWeb, of MAPA, for the period from 1998 to August 30, 2010. We also examined the legislation that regulates registration and protection procedures and its implications for plant breeding and plant product development. It was found that the private sector controls 73.1% of the registrations and 53.56% of the protections, while 10.73% of the protections were of material developed overseas. Public-private partnerships contributed little to the development of new cultivars, with 0.5% of the registries and 3.61% of the protections. We conclude that plant protection directed private investment to development of wheat and rice varieties, with the greatest public investments directed to corn and sorghum. After the Cultivar Protection Law was implemented, there was restriction of access to germplasm banks, which could inhibit advances in Brazilian plant breeding programs, indicating a need for revision of this legal barrier.