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  • Business - Companies
  • Updated: July 25, 2022

Poultry Production: CBN Partners Tertiary Institutions

Poultry Production: CBN Partners Tertiary Institutions

To improve the economy and create employment for youths in the country, Godwin Emefiele, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, has revealed that the CBN is partnering with some tertiary institutions on poultry production.

Emefiele, who spoke in Ilorin, Kwara State at the inauguration of the University of Ilorin GGMAX Integrated Commercial Poultry Farm, noted that the CBN Tertiary Institutions Poultry Revival Scheme (TIPRS), which is a collaboration with several institutions, was targeted “at boosting poultry production, creating decent jobs, fostering innovation in the poultry sub-sector.”

Edwin Nzelu, Deputy Director and Secretary to Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme Fund (ACGSF) of the bank, who represented the CBN Governor blamed the prevalence of smuggling of poultry products such as eggs and chicken meat on the country’s inability to meet up with its level of demand.

"The country’s demand for eggs and meat is currently outstripping its current supply by 1.2 million Metric Tonnes and 140,000 Metric Tonnes for meat and eggs respectively,” Nzelu said.

“Over the years, this demand gap has driven the smuggling of unhealthy frozen chicken into the country.

“To close this gap, the Central Bank of Nigeria has introduced various intervention schemes focused on boosting poultry production, creating decent jobs, and fostering innovation in the poultry sub-sector,” he said.

He further explained that the aim of the project is to bridge the wide gap between the demand for poultry products and the supply caused largely by the ban on the importation of poultry products.

The N600 million funding, which was provided to UNILORIN through Zenith Bank at a single-digit interest rate of 5 per cent, was expended on the construction of broiler and layers pen and cages, as well as procurement of over 50,000 birds, feed milling equipment, processing machinery and other ancillary poultry amenities.

Speaking, Professor Sulyman Abdulkareem, the Vice Chancellor of the university, said that the poultry farm is expected to contribute to food security in Nigeria.

“Construction started on the 30-hectare farm in the first week of February by the middle of May. The farm was in a state to receive, 17,000 Layers.

“Today, the farm has fully built broilers’ pens with a capacity for 5,000 birds each and another two of similar capacity, under construction, to raise the total installed capacity to 40,000 broilers; four fully built layers’ currently housing 17,000 layers though with an installed capacity 33,000; a feed mill with an installed capacity of 5tons/hour,  a semi-automated Broiler Processing Unit (BPU) with a capacity to produce 1,000 birds/day, and a Manure Processing Unit.”

However, the external consultant of the project, Professor Oluwafemi Balogun,  former Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAB), advised the university to take out the project from its administration.

 

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