In its bid to increase food production and create employment opportunities for the teeming youths, the Ogun State Government has kicked off its Broiler Empowerment Program with the delivery of 54, 000-day old chicks to 54 beneficiaries.
Adeola Odedina, special adviser to the Governor on Agriculture, who led a team from the Ministry of Agriculture to the Odeda Training Farm Institute, in Odeda, noted that the empowerment is based on Public-Private Partnership arrangement whereby the government provides necessary poultry infrastructure.
Odedina added that the Ministry of Agriculture is providing technical support for the project which was designed to meet the demand for poultry while reducing importation of frozen poultry products and create a source of livelihood for young agripreneurs through cluster farming.
“The project is located at the Odeda Farm Institute, Eweje where the state government had constructed six (6) poultry pens of 9,000 birds’ capacity, with an output of 54,000 broiler birds per round of 6 weeks,” he said in a statement.
“About 54 beneficiaries were trained for the programme, while 46 of them have received their loan of N900, 000 each. The expected minimum and maximum deliverable per annum from the project is 216, 000 birds (4rounds/annum) and 324,000 birds (6rounds /annum) respectively,” he further said.
“The expected output of between 216,000 to 324,000 broiler birds per annum will reduce importation of livestock products in the country as it will also create over 150 direct and indirect jobs for youths in the state,” Odedina added.
He noted that the expected output of between 216,000 to 324,000 broiler birds per annum will reduce the importation of livestock products into the country, thereby increasing the state’s Internally Generated Revenue.
He said each beneficiary, within 42 days with 1,000 birds each, will earn a minimal profit of about N130,000per cycle of production, noting that there is the option of buy-back as off-takers such as Amobyn Farms Limited, will mop up birds produced through a financing window by the Bank of Industry and Farmermoni Loan Program for Agriculture.
He further said that the success of the pilot phase will lead to replication in the other two senatorial districts of the State. He added that the initiative has engaged over 500 agripreneurs with an estimated output of over 800,000 broiler birds per annum.
According to him, at the end of a cycle of six weeks, it is expected that yield will be about 115, 000kg (570tons/annum) of poultry meat which will address the shortage of animal protein and drastically reduce the importation of frozen poultry products in the State and Nigeria at large.
Josephine Okojie
