Many people living on the margins struggle to find an income generating activity that could assist them in providing for themselves and their dependants especially in rural Sub-Saharan Africa. Life is extremely hard especially when you have to depend on your self to produce enough food for your family and at the same time engage in some economic activities that will provide some cash that can be used to pay for education and health care. Recently, I met a self-trained, charismatic chicken farmer who believes that chicken rearing is a profitable income generating activity that can assist in improving the living standards in his family.
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| Some of Mr. Hampuwo's chickens |
Timothy Hampuwo, a senior Zambian citizen living in Mulongo Village, Chief Hamaundu's area in Pemba, Southern Province, started rearing chickens in March 2009. Before leading life as an ordinary villager Mr Hampuwo was employed as a government teacher. His stock of birds is made up of indigenous breeds that are managed under a semi-controlled system. The chickens feed free range but in order to ensure that they have adequate nutrients their feed is supplemented their with organic food e.g. maize bran (which is sometimes mixed with sunflower cake or soya beans). In order to ensure that laying birds, which are housed in laying compartments on a raised grass and poles structure, have access to live ants (which are a major source of protein in the free range management system) Mr. Hampuwo has developed a very clever way of attracting the ants to the bird's cages. He puts dry or wet grass sprinkled with water in each laying compartment and this attracts the ants making them climb into the compartment to feed on the grass. In this way the laying birds have easier and adequate supply of ants. When it comes to avian disease and pest control, Mr Hampuwo relies on herbal drugs e.g. day old chicks are given a herbal mixture as vaccination against diseases.
Labour and capital requirements
Before seriously engaging in chicken rearing, Mr Hampuwo carried out an assessment to find out the advantages of chicken rearing as well as the requirements for a successful business. In his assessment he found out that chicken rearing does not require a lot of labour. The main tasks are feeding and giving water to the birds. The minimal labour requirements reduce the cost of production thus contributing to maximum returns on very little production inputs. According to Mr. Hampuwo it is possible even for those that do not have financial capital to start a chicken rearing business in the context of rural Zambia. This is because in the Zambian culture it is common for an individual to be given a chicken free of charge by a well wisher and this gift can be used to start a business. Another way is through borrowing a laying bird on condition that you repay by giving the lender an agreed number of chickens after a given period.
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| Brooding hens at Mr. Hampuwo's village |
Mr. Hampuwo has observed that his laying chickens lay eggs 4 times in a year and therefore produce chicks every 3 months. Each bird lays 15 eggs. After the eggs hatch he puts 10 chicks on his income generating business while 5 chicks are reserved for home consumption. His stock includes 25 laying birds, 2 cockrels that service the laying birds and 23 male birds. He plans to increase the number of his laying birds to 50 by March, 2011.
Marketing
Birds are sold at 8 or 10 months. Initially, Mr Hampuwo was selling his birds in his village and surrounding communities at the cost of K25,000 (approximately USD 2) each. Realising that this price was low he decided to do a market research so that he could get a higher price for his birds. He now sells his chickens in Lusaka, Zambia's capital city which is located hundreds of kilometers from his village. Twice a year he travels to Lusaka's Chilenje Market to sell his chickens where female birds are sold at K45,000 (approximately USD 9) and cockrels at K50,000 (approximately USD 10).
Conclusion
Chicken rearing is a very good income generating actitivity for resouce challenged areas such as rural areas. It is not very costly to start especially where the stock is made up of local indigenous chickens commonly referred to as 'village or free range chickens' in Zambia. The minimal labour requirements make chicken rearing an appropriate income generating activity even for labour constrained individuals such as the elderly or People Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). Mr Hampuwo's experience with this income generating activity has been very positive and other farmers can learn from this especially in terms of management and marketing.
