Despite many challenges faced by animal producers, including environmental problems, diseases, economic pressure, and feed
availability, it is still predicted that animal production in developing countries will continue to sustain the future growth of the world’s
meat production. In these areas, livestock performance is generally lower than those obtained in Western Europe and North America.
Although many factors can be involved, climatic factors are among the first and crucial limiting factors of the development of animal
production in warm regions. In addition, global warming will further accentuate heat stress-related problems. The objective of this
paper was to review the effective strategies to alleviate heat stress in the context of tropical livestock production systems. These
strategies can be classified into three groups: those increasing feed intake or decreasing metabolic heat production, those enhancing
heat-loss capacities, and those involving genetic selection for heat tolerance. Under heat stress, improved production should be
possible through modifications of diet composition that either promotes a higher intake or compensates the low feed consumption.
In addition, altering feeding management such as a change in feeding time and/or frequency, are efficient tools to avoid excessive
heat load and improve survival rate, especially in poultry. Methods to enhance heat exchange between the environment and the
animal and those changing the environment to prevent or limit heat stress can be used to improve performance under hot climatic
conditions. Although differences in thermal tolerance exist between livestock species (ruminants.monogastrics), there are also
large differences between breeds of a species and within each breed. Consequently, the opportunity may exist to improve thermal
tolerance of the animals using genetic tools. However, further research is required to quantify the genetic antagonism between
adaptation and production traits to evaluate the potential selection response. With the development of molecular biotechnologies,
new opportunities are available to characterize gene expression and identify key cellular responses to heat stress. These new tools
will enable scientists to improve the accuracy and the efficiency of selection for heat tolerance. Epigenetic regulation of gene
expression and thermal imprinting of the genome could also be an efficient method to improve thermal tolerance. Such techniques
(e.g. perinatal heat acclimation) are currently being experimented in chicken.