🇲🇱 The cattle breeds of Mali

Mali counts its cattle in the millions, herded alongside sheep, goats and camels across a mostly dry country. Milk and beef come from these herds, and livestock ranks among the country's leading exports. The great drought of 1972 to 1974 took about two in five animals, and herding has drifted south away from the spreading desert.

• The largest cattle concentrations lie north of Bamako and Ségou, reaching into the Niger delta.
• About 40% of Malian herds died in the 1972–74 drought.
• In 2019 Mali produced 276 million litres of cow's milk and 187,000 tons of beef.
• North and east of Timbuktu, camels, sheep and goats are raised instead of cattle.
• Livestock supplies about 5% of exports, after gold and cotton.

Cattle in Mali

Cattle keeping in Mali belongs to a farming world: most Malians live in the countryside, and agriculture occupies four in five workers, mostly on a small, subsistence scale where families grow food chiefly to feed themselves. The national herds run into the millions of animals and are one of the country's chief resources, kept alongside sheep, goats and camels. Cattle gather in greatest numbers north of Bamako and Ségou, reaching into the inland delta of the Niger, but drought has pushed herders steadily southwards since the 1970s. In the arid north and east, around Timbuktu, families rely on camels, sheep and goats rather than cattle. Livestock and cotton between them have long supplied most of what Mali sells abroad, though gold now leads the export list.

Regions and communities

The cattle map of Mali has a clear shape. The biggest concentrations graze the land north of Bamako and Ségou, stretching out into the inland delta of the Niger. Farther off, north and east of Timbuktu, the country is too dry for cattle and herders keep camels, sheep and goats in their place. Drought has been redrawing this pattern: with the desert pressing in, many nomadic herders of the north have settled down to farm, and stock raising as a whole continues to slide southwards. The shift points towards the wetter, crop-growing south of the country.

Milk, butter and beef

Malian cattle give both milk and meat. In 2019 the country's cows yielded about 276 million litres of milk, and beef production came to some 187,000 tons. Herds of camels, goats and sheep added milk of their own in similar amounts, and lamb joined beef on the market. Cattle also earn money abroad: livestock accounts for roughly 5% of exports by value, ranking behind gold and cotton, and in past counts cotton and livestock together supplied three quarters or more of yearly exports.

Today

Cattle remain a mainstay of a farm economy that gives work to four in five Malians and is vulnerable to drought. Exports of livestock have grown, yet gold now tops the list of what Mali sells abroad, with cotton second and livestock at about 5%. After the droughts of the 1970s and 1980s the herds recovered slowly, but in the north, where the desert has taken the grazing, numbers are not expected to climb back to their old levels, and many former herders now farm instead.