Guinea pigs, widely reared for meat in Latin America, are also bred in a number of sub-Saharan African countries, a practice that has received virtually no attention from government institutions and agricultural sector policy-makers. The findings of three years of joint research indicate that there are many socio-economic advantages of traditional guinea pig farming in Cameroon and that the productivity of these small herbivores may be improved through the development of a more appropriate feeding system as well as through the adoption of simple livestock management techniques based on controlled weaning and mating and the elimination of inbreeding.
