The National Coordination Commission for the conservation, improvement and promotion of livestock breeds agreed on March 24 to the recognition of the "Canary camel" breed, which will be included in the official catalog of livestock breeds in Spain. The Association for Rural Development of Lanzarote, Aderlan, explains that five years ago it began a work of promotion and support for the camel livestock of Yaiza, "which has finally paid off."
This project, called "Consolidation and improvement of Camel Livestock in Lanzarote", was subsidized by the Community Initiative Leader Plus through the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund, co-financed by the Ministry of Agriculture of the Government of the Canary Islands, the Ministry of Environment, Rural and Marine Affairs and the Cabildo of Lanzarote.
One of the actions of the project was the realization of a genetic study of the dromedary population, which was carried out by the Department of Genetics of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine of the Complutense University of Madrid. This report supports the situation in which the population of Canary camels finds itself and justifies the need to implement a genetic conservation program that allows the efficient management of current genetic diversity.
For this, it is necessary the recognition of this native population of the Autonomous Community of the Canary Islands by the competent authorities. This has now occurred through the agreement adopted by the National Coordination Commission for the Conservation, Improvement and Promotion of Livestock Breeds. This recognition represents an enormous advance that will help in the consolidation of the Canary camel breed.
Camel livestock, despite its great involvement in the image of the island and in a sector as prominent as tourism, "does not receive the necessary attention to maintain and improve over time", according to Aderlan in a statement. "As it is a minority professional group and very different from any other activity, it is not cataloged as part of livestock itself nor is it accepted as belonging to the tourism sector. This exclusionary situation greatly hinders its progress and consolidation at all levels", they indicate from the association.
Through the project promoted by Aderlan, together with the efforts and efforts of the Association of Breeders of the Canary Camel (ACCC), they wanted to reach a solution that allows to maintain and even improve the breed. "These actions must be carried out as soon as possible because we are still in time to rescue the population with a good genetic variability that allows it to be maintained with the quality that characterizes it today", they point out.
