Poultry Management Challenges facing our poultry farmers today

Modern poultry farming in Kenya began after independence, starting as a cottage practice providing kitchen table needs. For many years it became the only cheap source of nutrition for poor families back in the days.

Today, poultry farming is a huge business that involves other operations like hatcheries, feed mills, processing plants, broiler and layer farms. In nearly all setups, poultry farming is highly profitable, but today farmers are still facing a myriad of challenges. Let’s look at the five most common challenges.

High cost of feed

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It is true that 70 per cent of the entire cost of rearing chicks to market weight or start of egg product is due to feed cost. 

Animal feed is one of the single most important farm inputs in poultry production of both meat and eggs and the high cost of it is making our farmers earn meagre margins.

Maize, oats, wheat, barley, sorghum, Rice bran, Soyabean meal, fish, sunflower and cotton seed cakes are some of the raw materials that are mainly used in feed formulations, yet these products are expensive to produce in this region.

Most feed millers must import these products from Uganda, Tanzania, Ukraine and India at high landed costs.

Poor feed quality

A good quality diet is one that is properly formulated, and which is appropriate to the breed and species of bird and the stage of growth or production.

Quality feed is measured by the level of utilisation in the gut of a chicken, sometimes referred to as feed conversion efficiency. Feeds low in energy, protein, essential amino acids and or minerals will only lead to growth and production problems.

Feeding birds with higher levels of mycotoxin-contaminated feed can result in either the birds refusing to eat such contaminated feed resulting into immediate drop in growth and or production or if they end up consuming such feed, will suppress their immunity against diseases. Aflatoxins, which are the main problem in this part of the world have been demonstrated to cause damages of livers in poultry. The toxins are known to cause drop in the tissue levels of Vitamins in the plasma, liver, and bile of chickens. This will result into poor health, immunosuppression, poor production, un-thriftiness, and ultimately death.

Poor access to market

Poultry products are unique by their nature, they are biological assets that lose their quality and value over a specified time even when handled correctly throughout the value chain. They require specific storage conditions, handling techniques and expertise to reduce damage, deaths, spoilage, contamination, and expiry.

Most of our rural farmers find it difficult to access the market readily. To make it successful, farmers must, more than ever build resources and tools to help them explore, penetrate, and deliver product into this dynamic and volatile market.

Your overall goal is to gain competitive advantage by understanding the needs and wants of your customers wherever they are. Farmers must consider networking, direct marketing, advertising, direct selling, relying on referrals and social media to reach potential buyers.

High cost of production

This starts with the choice of breed and trait of your poultry. Please consult widely for the right choice of breed and type for your poultry venture. Go for a breed with predictable performance characteristics.

The other four most important farm inputs that must be properly managed are cost of housing, brooding, clean water, cleaning and disinfection and husbandry.

Poultry diseases

Most people venturing into poultry production and processing are weary of the challenges that this industry experiences from time to time, disease outbreak is one of the scaring occurrences that farmers face.

But this need not to be, if one takes time to understand what it takes to keep commercial flock healthy, there is great opportunity to reap maximum benefit from disease-free poultry production. Biosecurity is all about processes or procedures that you must put in place to prevent introduction of disease- causing organisms or agents from infecting your precious flocks. The other is correct and appropriate vaccination of your flocks.

Training on basic flock health care, feeding and watering techniques and ability to spot sick, isolated and depressed birds is a prerequisite for better performance.