RESEARCH ASSOCIATED WITH GENETIC EVALUATIONS OF DAIRY CATTLE IN MEXICO

Abstract

The objective of this review is to provide an outlook of the main findings of the research associated with genetic evaluations of dairy cattle populations in Mexico, and to identify the work performed by researchers and opportunity areas for future research. The review included papers published in scientific journals for the last 20 years (1997-2017). The study topics are related with: effect of environmental factors, estimation of genetic parameters and genetic trends, flow of genetic material and genotype by environment interaction, and studies associated with molecular genetics. The estimation of genetic parameters has been extensively studied for milk yield, with estimators of sufficient magnitude to design and implement genetic improvement programs. Even though there is progress in the publication of studies related with genetic evaluations, the improvement of basic issues related with more complete and reliable databases, and with the use of predicted genetic values in national animal breeding programs is needed. It is required to document the study of more accurate methodologies of genetic evaluation, especially for populations and traits less studied.