Astere Ndayirata CJCU/IPSD Graduate NEZERWA Poultry Farm Report After completing a four day New Entrepreneurship program workshop organized by CJCU Yunus Social Business center in collaboration with The International Program for Sustainable Development and got a financial support from same Yunus social business Center and started the chicken project in my village while teaming up with some local people. The project has a lot to bring to the local people and myself too. Low production of chicken meat and eggs, poverty, joblessness are some of the problems that are manifested in MUKUNGU my home village. Chicken meat is one of the most expensive food on the entire land and consequently, chicken meat is a precious food not to be eaten by everyone or ordinary people. So many people try to breed few hens in their homes but they end up getting discouraged by hens’’ diseases, luck of skills, luck of enough resources to easily run the chicken business etc. NEZERWA poultry farm is a chicken business that comes to solve some of the above mentioned problems. It is a business that comes as one of the ways to promote some of 17 goals for sustainable development such as goals: no hunger, no poverty, decent work and economic growth et, and most important it is a first chicken in the entire district. So the positive impact will be much more remarkable in coming few months.
The project itself Early in July as a landed in Burundi from Taiwan, the project got started immediately. The project activities with first of all meeting the local people to let them know all about the project, the reason why we need to come together all for one project. The discussion did not take much time because everyone knew about the project even before my arrival in the country. It was also very import to start with the understanding of all about chicken food, health and chicken’s life in general. It is from this reason why before any activity to get started we invited a vet to give a lecture about chicken farm. The vet focused so much on diseases which many and various and the biggest problem for every chicken farm to succeed, however, he mentioned that diseases can be treat easily once the business runners is keen to care enough of the farm. That is why the vet thinks that it is very crucial for whoever is running a chicken farm business to know the condition of every chicken in farm on daily basis, so the behavior of will determine what kind of disease and effective treatment of the disease.
During the workshop the vet did not forget to mention about the food which is one of the most important element when it comes to growing and health of the chicken, you can’t provide any food to the chicken, the chicken feeding activity will depend mostly on how old the chickens are, a one month chick will be fed different food two months chick. By considering the age of the chickens, you will not only understand what kind of food they need but what quantity of food for each chicken. Another important point in this business before you start is to know what kind of product you want to produce between eggs and meat. Some chickens will produce more eggs and others will produce more meats. So, according to the vet, if you want to produce eggs you will choose chicken species that lay more eggs and feed more rice especially in eggs laying period. You need to do the same when you want to breed chicken for meat you need to provide fat food for chicken so they will be fat and produce more meat than the eggs producing chicken. Picture after the first meeting
These beautiful pictures were taken after the first meeting with INEZA association on the project. After a good discussion with the association members, we agreed to work together in to start the business and promote the idea of ‘’ job givers not job seekers’’. We agreed to promote sustainable development by thinking the future of our children. We do not what will happen tomorrow but we strongly believe that our great children will benefit a lot from the chicken business that we have started today.
Pictures during the vet’s workshop Everyone in the meeting The vet speaking
Chicken house construction activities After hearing a lot from the vet about chicken farm such as food, disease, treatment, etc., the followed step was to build a chicken house according to the advice from the vet. The size of the house will depend on how many chicken you want to raise. The more chicken you have the bigger the house will be, the less the chicken you need to raise the smaller the chicken house will be. So, since we were planning to start the business with one hundred chicken, the vet came up with the idea that we can build a 10x4m house and so chicken will have enough space to eat, drink water, fly and even play. So, the chicken house construction activities started by collecting construction which are 100% traditional. The chicken house is made of local wood, trees cut down from those were planted by roots and shoots in my village, these trees are so many and there enough tree to be cut and some tree to be conserved. Additionally, there are material from palm trees, these material are very familiar in the region, and they are mostly in so many homes to build fancies as well small houses that look traditional. So, the chicken house I made in traditional material.
Pictures while collecting materials
Astere Together with some of association members collecting materials
After the collection of consturction materials and got enough of them, the consctruction activities got started immediatelly.
Chicken house construction activities
underway.
Other activities included roofing, floor paving, electricity installation, cleaning etc and so we have a complete chicken house
Roofing
Floor paving
Electricity installation
Done chicken house \
After completing all the chicken house construction works, it was important to think how to move in the chickens. Moving the chickens in was one of the most complicated part of the project. The best chicken farm in Burundi is located in central province of Burundi commonly known as Gitega, the province I question is located very far from my village where the business is taking project. Apart from the distance from Gitega to the project site, the government has so much strengthened the domestic animals transportation rules that are seen as rules to reduce traffic accidents, animals diseases spread as well as animals’ right. It is from this reason that shipping the chickens from Gitega province was not easy task. After receiving the permission from the government, 100 chickens were shipped August 28th, 2021 and received on the same day. Pictures while receiving the chicks
The first day of the chickens in the house.
Total cost investment
Chicken Care
Food care: chicken farm is one of the farm that needs care on daily basis. Chicken farm care focuses on food, health care. It is really complicated to feed animal, especially chickens, if you want your farm to be successful, chickens are not fed anything or anytime. Food varies from one time other, as I mentioned in previous paragraph, food quality and quantity are both determined by how old the chickens are. Chickens of two months are fed differently fed from 5 months chickens in terms of quality. So what do we fed the chickens since the first day up to time being?
Up to the time being, we have not yet changed the quality of the food but the quantity has been changed from 2.5kg to 3kg a day. The main food include: corn, sorghum, white rice, rice husks mixed with rice, dried fish. All these ingredients are mixed in one items and ground to become a concentrate mixture of chicken food.
Picture while mixing chicken food ingredient
Food mixture
Chickens eating
Health care: hens are one of the domestic animals that has so many diseases while making their life ephemeral. However, in this business we do not blink and forget to take care of the chicken and make sure all the chickens are fine and healthy. It is from this reason that in collaboration the vet, we have strengthen measures that will help us not lose as many chickens as possible from diseases. We bought medicine, for vaccination, health care when chickens are already affected or sick as well as medicines to be mixed with water. So, besides of the vaccination they have received, chickens will drink water mixed with water for the whole week.
Chicken Medicines
Challenges 1. Luck of enough resources is one of the challenges of the business.so, it has become an obligation for everyone in this business to contribute some money on monthly basis so as to buy food for the chickens and some other necessary items, it challenge because the people I am working with are old and poor, to get money from their them is a problem. The consequences now is that the quality of chickens’ life is not that much high. 2. Diseases are also a big challenge to the business, this is because the chickens are attacked by numerous diseases, so it is not easy to control and treat every single disease. That is why in 100 chickens as total number that were previously bought, 5 of them are dead because the same problems.
Meetings and members’ tasks It is an obligation for every person involved in this business to attend a general meeting every Saturday morning. The meeting will discuss about anything concerning the chicken farm such as security of the chicken house site, food and health of the chicken, etc. Meeting day’s pictures.
Future plan There are big plans in future for the business to become much more successful. Within few month, the chicken will start laying eggs and we plan to buy an incubator so as to have as many chicks as possible, at least 100 chicks a month. The other plan is for member to have at least 5 chickens in their homes that is why workshops are very important in order for everyone to experience the chicken farm in real life. Member takes turns in feeding and taking care of the chickens only for them to get used to chicken farm activity and they can in the future use the same skills and raise their own chickens.
Unexpected mission It is not about the business itself but the new mission is related to sustainable development. When it came to security of the business site, we all thought of buying a dog to help and make sure there is security day and night. However, they were so many stray dog with puppies in the village. Stray dogs affect a lot human health y spreading parasites and highly contagious diseases. Stray dogs have also a big impact on the environment. When a non-native species overtake an area, it can negatively impact delicate ecosystems. Stray dogs are usually not vaccinated, leading to transmission of rabies and other life threatening diseases to other animal population. For these above reasons, I and my business partners, we decided to rescues 4 stray dogs, I was able to convince the group the impact of stray dogs, so 3 puppies are adopted by members of the Ineza association and one stray puppy is adopted at the business site for the site security reasons.
Rescued puppies
They are actually 4 rescued stray dogs but I was able to take picture of 3 puppies.
Conclusion In brief NEZERWA poultry farm is taking the right direction to success up to time being. The business start succeeded up to 98%. The number of the inspired people by the business is getting higher day after day after day.
Today’s chickens’ life condition
Enjoying night time at the chicken farm