It is characterised by achondroplasia or dwarfism, a trait that may have evolved in response to conditions in the humid forests of the area, and also by some degree of resistance to tsetse-borne trypanosomiasis or "sleeping-sickness".

[3]: 106 The goats have at various times been exported to European countries and to the United States, initially as zoo animals or for laboratory research.

Several breeds derive from these imports, among them the American Pygmy and Nigerian Dwarf in the United States, the Pygmy in the United Kingdom, the Dutch Dwarf or Nederlandse Dwerggeit in the Netherlands, and the Tibetana in Italy.

Nigerian West African Dwarf goats are trypanotolerant (they resist to infections by Trypanosoma) and haemonchotolerant (they resist infections with the gastrointestinal parasite nematode Haemonchus contortus more effectively than other breeds of domestic goat).

[5] West African Dwarf goats are capable of breeding at twelve to eighteen months.