Botswana’s livestock sector is changing beneath the headline numbers, with the latest Agricultural Census pointing to a more complex picture of declining cattle numbers alongside growth in commercial production, goats and sheep. The findings from the 2025 Agricultural Census are expected to give government, farmers, investors and development partners a clearer basis for deciding where the sector needs support as climate pressures, livestock diseases and constraints on grazing resources reshape production.
The Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Lands and Agriculture, Kefentse Motshegwa, said reliable and current agricultural data is essential to understanding these shifts and directing interventions where they are most needed. The census shows that Botswana’s national cattle population declined by 6.1% between 2015 and 2025. At the same time, the commercial cattle subsector recorded growth, while goat and sheep populations increased.
For Statistics Botswana Statistician General Raymond Lekobane, the contrasting trends underline the need to look beyond aggregate livestock figures and examine how production is evolving across species, production systems and districts. The changes come as livestock producers contend with increasingly difficult operating conditions. Recent droughts, livestock diseases, climate variability and pressure on grazing resources continue to constrain production and expose vulnerabilities across the sector.
Motshegwa said the census provides an opportunity to identify where targeted investment is required, particularly in water infrastructure, sustainable rangeland management, fodder production, veterinary services, vaccination, agricultural extension and biosecurity. The value of the census, he stressed, will ultimately depend on what follows the data. In addition, Motshegwa said the findings should not remain statistics on paper but must be translated into policies and programmes that improve productivity, resilience and sustainability within the livestock sector.
That places greater emphasis on how government and industry respond to the structural changes emerging from the census. The decline in national cattle numbers, alongside expansion in other livestock categories and the commercial subsector, suggests that Botswana’s livestock economy cannot be understood through cattle numbers alone. Lekobane encouraged policymakers, researchers, farmers, investors and other stakeholders to use the findings to deepen their understanding of the agricultural sector and strengthen evidence-based decision-making.
The preliminary results are expected to undergo further analysis, with the full 2025 Agricultural Census report scheduled for dissemination by December 2026. The data arrives at a critical point as the country seeks to strengthen domestic agricultural production, diversify its economy and build greater resilience to climate and production risks. The census may therefore prove most valuable not for what it says about the size of Botswana’s livestock herd, but for what it reveals about the direction in which the sector is moving.
