Recently, the Food Safety and Standard Authority of India classified Himalayan yak as an animal used for food (FSSAI).
- The Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairy recommended it (DAHD).
- Categorization will stop the yak population’s decrease and promote its rearing.
Himalayan Yak
- The Himalayan Yak is a long-haired, short-legged, ox-like mammal and high-altitude bovine animal that is primarily found in Tibet and India.
- In India, it can be found in Ladakh, Jammu and Kashmir, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh, and West Bengal. Yak rearing is unorganised, primitive, and difficult because it is raised for transportation, meat, milk, wools, and dung that
- Yak milk is nourishing, high in fat, and has medical benefits.
- Yaks use snow to gain water, and calves are born about nine months later.
- Yak can survive in very cold temperatures up to minus 40 degrees.
- In Ladakh, Sikkim, and Himachal Pradesh, there are Changpas and Dokpas, nomadic communities that raise yak.
- The 2019 census shows that India has 58,000 yaks.
- From the 2012 livestock census, it has decreased by 25%.
- Less compensation from yaks may be contributing to the decline in yak numbers.
- It dissuades people from continuing to rear yaks in a nomadic fashion. The domesticated yak is known as Bos grunniens, whereas the wild kind is known as Bos mutus.
Conservation status
- IUCN: Vulnerable
- CITES- Appendix I
- Indian WildLife (Protection) Act of 1972: Schedule II
The Government of India established the ICAR-National Research Centre on Yak in Dirang, Arunachal Pradesh, as a specialised centre for yak husbandry research in 1989.