Our Reporter
TO increase food production and create employment opportunities for youths, the Ogun Government has kicked off its Broiler Empowerment Programme with the delivery of 54, 000 day old chicks for 54 beneficiaries.
The Special Adviser to the Governor on Agriculture, Dr. Adeola Odedina, who led a team from the Ministry of Agriculture, while taking stock of the broiler birds at the Odeda Training Farm Institute, said the programme was designed as a public-private partnership (PPP).
He said the Ministry of Agriculture is providing support for the project, designed to, create source of livelihood for young agripreneurs through a cluster farming model.
Odedina said each beneficiary would get 1,000 birds. It will take about 42 days make a profit of about N130,000 per production.
He added that there is the option of buy-back as off-takers like, Amobyn Farms Limited, will mop up the birds produced through a financing window provided by the Bank of Industry and Farmer moni Loan Programme for Agriculture.
He said the success of the pilot phase would lead to replication in other two senatorial districts of the state.
“The project is located at the Odeda Farm Institute, Eweje, where the state government had constructed six poultry pens of 9,000 birds capacity, with an output of 54,000 broiler birds per round of six weeks. Fifty-four beneficiaries were trained for the programme, while 46 have received a loan of N900, 00.
The expected minimum and maximum deliverable per year from the project is 216, 000 birds (five rounds/annum) and 324,000 birds (six rounds /annum) .
The expected output of between 216,000 to 324,000 broiler birds per year 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 said.