Typicity of Mediterranean sheep products: improvement of nutrition and feeding

International audienceSheep production systems of the Mediterranean circle have a large historical background both in their typical use of rangelands and fertile areas and on their lambs and dairy products. These systems are however very diversified and there is no simple and unique way to improve feeding systems and to isolate strong competitive advantages. Their main competitive advantages being firstly to be located close to their traditional markets the second advantage being to have specific products that are well identified and closely linked to their practices on a given territory and in a region. Hence, the main way to give them a stronger advantage is probably to qualify seriously, by geographical specifications, the production system as a whole. With feeding systems that include transhumance, the geographical certification with automated GPS and e-ID (electronic identification), which can be done by the shepherd himself, could be a reliable mean to remunerate the fundamental ecological service they provide. In other systems, such as sedentary ones, this geographical link to the territory can be reinforced by rules that imply a limitation of imported forages and concentrates thus leading to better use of all available local resource. This choice is, however, a strong constraint that can be solved, here again, by means of electronic devices (selective passages) using e-ID, in order to automatically allocate animals for an efficient use of local resources according to their requirements and/or their genetic potential. Hence there is a need for farmers to integrate such tools of “precision husbandry” in order to improve their products quality chain (and traceability) and to efficiently use Mediterranean local resources. On the social point of view, a better access to rangelands, limited conflicts with other rural activities would greatly help these productions to gain competitive advantages. In addition, it must be admitted that farmer incentives have to be a new income to sustain livestock ecological activities (livestock biodiversity interactions