Final answer:
The ability of an animal to produce offspring or food products is referred to as its fecundity, which is the potential reproductive capacity relating to how many offspring it could produce.
Step-by-step explanation:
The ability of an animal to produce offspring or food products is called its fecundity. Fecundity is the potential reproductive capacity of an individual within a population. It describes how many offspring could ideally be produced if an individual has as many offspring as possible. This is related to how much energy an organism invests in reproduction versus the parental care of the offspring.
Species that produce many offspring generally provide less parental care, which allows them to maximize their evolutionary fitness. Whether animals are reproducing through simple cell division or more complex methods involving mating and gestation, the process is central to the survival of a species. This biological imperative ensures the continuation of a species by passing on genetic information to subsequent generations.