Mr Samuel Odunsi, Chairman, Poultry Farmers Association of Nigeria, Ogun Chapter, has urged the Federal Government to ensure availability and easy access to funds to boost poultry production by farmers.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!Odunsi made the appeal in an interview with Naija247news.com in Abeokuta on Monday.
He said that most small scale poultry farmers were unable to expand their farms because of lack of funds.
The chapter chairman noted that more poultry farms had stopped production due to inadequate funds, increase in interest rates on agriculture loans and high cost of raw materials.
Odunsi also identified obtaining of loan from banks as another major problem facing poultry farmers.
He expressed the fear that the challenges might lead to low productivity and marginal profits if not checked.
“Running poultry business is not an easy task; farmers need to have enough money to fund the business because it is capital intensive.
“The birds need to be fed on daily basis in order to have good products.
“This does not leave out the money spent on buying vaccines to prevent the outbreak of diseases which can be disastrous for the farmer when it happens,” he said.
He urged the Federal Government to enable poultry farmers to have access to single digit bank loan, saying that it would enhance steady growth in the agriculture sector.
Odunsi appealed to the government to always involve the poultry farmers when decisions that would affect them were made.
“We believe that as key stakeholders in the agriculture sector, government must seek our own input on any issue that concern agriculture in the country,” he said.
