Poultry project pilots production programme to cut down on cost

The Ghana Poultry Project (GPP) is piloting a programme that seeks to cut down on the cost of production through the use of modern poultry farming practices to enhance the competitiveness of poultry products.

When adopted, the programme, which is being supported by the United States Department of Agriculture, would produce quality broilers for the Ghanaian market.

Project

Under the GPP, three demonstration farms have been established with each being supplied with day-old chicks from a local hatchery. They are fed with local feed and provided with pens in a standardised form.

The farmers are also trained on how to prevent the spread of diseases and feeding methods that enable the chicks to mature by seven weeks.

Tour

The Value Chain Leader of the GPP, Mr Kweku B. Tuoho, announced this during a visit to some of the demonstration farms by more than 30 farmers and poultry experts from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), the University of Ghana, Legon, and a veterinary agency.

He said under the project, the GPP would also ensure that day-old chicks were produced under best practices to help reduce mortality, as well as enable farmers to increase their productivity at a lower cost.

Mr Tuoho urged poultry farmers taking part in the GPP to take the practical lessons seriously.

He further urged operators in the industry to put premium on increasing production of broilers for the local market.

According to him, that was the surest way of saving the nation from spending huge sums of foreign exchange on the importation of broilers.

Challenge

Over the years, Ghana’s poultry industry has faced stiff competition from imported products, high production cost, especially feed, which constitutes 60 per cent of the production cost.

Statistics from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) indicate that, Ghana’s broiler production fell from nearly 60 per cent of all poultry products consumed in Ghana in 2000 to 20 per cent in 2011.

Within the same period, imports increased from 13,900 tonnes to over 155,000 tonnes, thus more than a 1,000 per cent increase.

In 2013, the Global Agricultural Information Network also estimated that the 2012 domestic share of broiler meat was 10 per cent of national consumption.

The FAO attributed this to the many poultry producers focusing more on egg production.

Dr Kwaku Adomako of the Department of Animal Science of the KNUST also expressed worry over the high cost of poultry feed and other inputs in the country.