The UN millennium goal of halving the percent of people in poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa by 2015, will not be achieved. Where animal scientists have contributed to this failure, they have assumed that small farms are inefficient and will be improved by adopting scaled-down versions of the large commercial systems in which their science has evolved. Kenya illustrates the problem, with its rural poverty and a project to increase the standard of living of smallholders through milk production. Despite the socio-economic difference from the large dairy farm, the cow of choice for these small zero-grazing units remains the Friesian (F), but her productivity is so low as to threaten the sustention of the system (Bebe, 2003). We need to understand why the breed is popular, what shapes the lactation curve and extends the calving interval (CI), and what are sustainable levels of milk and calf production.