Rare Breeds Canada Rare Breeds Canada Rare Breeds Canada (RBC) is a Canadian non-profit organization dedicated to preserving rare breeds of Canadian livestock. The organization was founded in 1987. It focuses on the rare breeds of livestock originating in Canada, including varieties of horses, sheep, pigs, chickens and cows. RBC publishes a Rare Breeds Priority List that separates livestock breeds into "critical", "endangered", "vulnerable", "at risk" and "recovering" categories. To assist with the preservation of these breeds, RBC coordinates a breeding program which uses host farms to manage small breeding groups which are used to build new flocks of animals. As the new
Animal genetic resources for food and agriculture assessments of livestock biodiversity: "The State of the World's Animal Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture" (2007) and "The Second Report on the State of the World's Animal Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture" (2015). Although many diverse species and breeds of animals are currently available for food and agricultural production, there is more work to be done on classifying their risk of extinction: in 2014, 17% of the world's farm animal breeds are at risk of extinction and 58% are of unknown risk status, meaning that the problem may be underestimated. The world's pool of animal genetic resources is