Regional breed sheet Asino Romagnolo: milk production as a new use

Background

Who, when, what kind of text

Under its Regional Law No. 1/2008, the Emilia-Romagna region keeps a voluntary register of local animal breeds and plant varieties of agricultural interest. There is a technical data sheet for each breed; the sheet on the Asino Romagnolo (code RER A020) was revised in 2023 and published in the regional official gazette in December 2024.

The Asino Romagnolo, also called Asino di Sant’Alberto, was entered in the register in 2010 (Determina no. 14799 of 20.12.2010). A ministerial decree of 16 February 2006 added it to the national register of equids of local origin. The studbook is now kept by the association ANAREAI.

The sheet describes the history of the breed: use as a pack and light draught animal, mule breeding, a sharp decline after the Second World War and through mechanisation, and recovery from the 2000s with initially 76 recorded animals.

Content

What the source reports about donkey milk

Under “Caratteri produttivi”, the sheet describes the traditional uses and notes that milk production represents a new line of use. A large farm with this orientation is located in the hills near Reggio Emilia.

In the standardised survey form on husbandry, machine milking is ticked alongside pasture and stable keeping and natural reproduction.

On numbers, the sheet gives 350 farms and 1,152 registered animals, of which 839 are in Emilia-Romagna (including 298 in the province of Reggio Emilia and 251 in Forlì-Cesena). The breed is considered endangered but is included in conservation programmes.

Biometric standards: height at the withers at 30 months 135–155 cm for stallions and 130–145 cm for mares.