In general, survival traits had the highest economic value, followed by reproduction, growth rate and food intake, respectively. Predicted economic values for individual traits decreased with increasing discount rates. This was much more pronounced in reproductive traits than in all other traits. Removal of food intake from the objective tended to slightly increase the relative economic importance of reproductive traits and survival from birth to weaning, but trends in economic values almost remained the same. It was concluded that smallholder cattle owners should be encouraged to use local breeds of cattle, whilst efforts are made to breed trypanotolerant larger cattle breeds.