This low rate of improvement has discouraged implementation of selection schemes for indigenous tropical breeds, since the overall increase in production attainable by selection in cows yielding 500–1000 kg is not of any great magnitude. It should, however, be recalled that even European breeds were as unproductive as the tropical breeds before the application of selection programs and it is the application of planned selection programs that has brought the advances that we see today. Since the techniques for genetic improvement are even more developed today than when they were first used on European cattle, it is not inconceivable.
