The Small East African (SEA) goat (Capra hircus) breeds are widely
distributed in different agro-ecological zones of Tanzania. We report
the genetic diversity, maternal origin, and phylogenetic relationship
among the 12 Tanzanian indigenous goats populations, namely Fipa (n =
44), Songwe (n = 34), Tanga (n = 33), Pwani (n = 40), Newala (n = 49),
Lindi (n = 46), Gogo (n = 73), Pare (n = 67), Maasai (n = 72), Sukuma (n
= 67), and Ujiji (n = 67), based on the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA)
D-loop. High haplotype (Hd = 0.9619-0.9945) and nucleotide (π =
0.0120-0.0162) diversities were revealed from a total of 389 haplotypes.
The majority of the haplotypes (h = 334) drawn from all the goat
populations belonged to Haplogroup A which was consistent with the
global scenario on the genetic pattern of maternal origin of all goat
breeds in the world. Haplogroup G comprised of 45 haplotypes drawn from
all populations except the Ujiji goat population while Haplogroup B with
10 haplotypes was dominated by Ujiji goats (41%). Tanzanian goats
shared four haplotypes with the Kenyan goats and two with goats from
South Africa, Namibia, and Mozambique. There was no sharing of
haplotypes observed between individuals from Tanzanian goat populations
with individuals from North or West Africa. The indigenous goats in
Tanzania have high genetic diversity defined by 389 haplotypes and
multiple maternal origins of haplogroup A, B and G. There is a lot of
intermixing and high genetic variation within populations which
represent an abundant resource for selective breeding in the different
agro-ecological regions of the country.
Mitochondrial DNA D-loop sequence variability reveals high haplotype diversity and multiple maternal origins in twelve indigenous goat populations from Tanzania.