Problems And Prospects Of Poultry Industry In Bangladesh

Problems and Prospects of Poultry Industry in Bangladesh: A Study on Some Selected Areas By

Mohammad Shamsuddoha Assistant Professor, Department of Marketing, University of Chittagong, Bangladesh

Mir Hossain Sohel Lecturer, Department of Marketing, University of Chittagong, Bangladesh

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ABSTRACT Poultry is a substantial contributor to food supply of Bangladesh. Many small and medium farmers are rearing poultry birds in Bangladesh. Bangladesh is considered as one of the most appropriate countries in the world for poultry rearing. Development of poultry has generated considerable employment through the production and the marketing of poultry and poultry related products. Small improvements in this industry will, in productive and economic terms, give substantial increases to the benefits of the household may obtain from poultry, measured as a relative increase of output. In real terms, output may go up to $150 per year— a small amount of money, but in a situation where total income do not exceed $476 a year, such possibilities for improvement of livelihood deserve to be pursued. The revolution in poultry industry has achieved

more than 200 percent growth last 5 years though they are facing scarcity of efficient or skilled workforce, mainly because of new technology, using locally available feed ingredients, breeding, hatching and other inputs. Having such potentiality for a long time, Bangladesh could not be able to prepare her human resources for this industry. If Bangladesh will be able to do so, the human resources can contribute much more than what they are performing now. It will generate much more protein in our domestic needs. This paper aims to show the picture of the growth of poultry industry, status of existing labor or workforces and some recommendations regarding its policy matter. Keywords: Poultry, Human Resources, Bangladesh

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1. INTRODUCTION Land and life are closely entwined in Bangladesh. Over 80% of the Country's people live in the rural sector and are highly dependent on an agricultural system that is finely attuned to a tropical monsoon climate. The Human Development Reports – 2005 of UNDP indicates that the total population in Bangladesh is 14.18 crore at an annual growth rate of 1.7 percent. The per capita income is only US$ 476 (BBS 2006) and the percentage of literacy is around 51.6 per cent (BBS 2006, BANBEIS). 50 percent of the households are functionally landless (22 percent of the households owning no land other than their homesteads and 28 percent owning only up to 0.50 acre) while 6 percent of the land owning households are controlling more than 40 percent of the total land (Hossain 1997). About 47.5 percent people live below the poverty line and they receive less than 1900 calorie per person per day as against the standard of 2300 calories (HDI, UNDP 1996). In 1998-99, total meat production in Bangladesh was 656,000 tonnes, of which chicken and duck meat contributed 154,000 tonnes, which ra nked second after beef. Per capita meat consumption was only 5.12 kg per year (Statistical yearbook of Bangladesh 2000), and per capita protein intake 63gm per day (Statistical Bulletin Bangladesh 2003) which is markedly below recommended requirements. As protein intake is recommended to be in the range of 0.8 to 1.6 gm/day per kg body weight for humans (Anonymous 1998), this requires 56 to 112g protein per day for a person of 70 kg body weight. Thus there is a need to increase the animal protein production to fulfil the demand of the people and subsequently to make them sound and healthy for increasing their working ability. Meat production could be increased through chicken rearing, and chicken meat is the most popular meat throughout the country. In urban or rural areas, any gr eat festival of either religion or social origin is unimaginable without roasted chicken. People think that it is a great dishonour not to serve roast chicken at a festival.

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In a condition, where majority of the people are landless, under privileged, malnourished, uneducated and poor, poultry rearing play a very important role for income generation, poverty eradication, women empowerment, nutrition, food security and country's economical and developmental procedure. Livestock rearing rarely forms a separate land-use enterprise in Bangladesh. Nearly all animals are kept on farms, closely integrated into agricultural production systems. There are over 116.5 million chickens. However, with increasing population and decreasing land holdings, the number of poultry is increasing at an annual rate of 5.9% (Reneta Statistical Year Book, 2005) . At present most of the poultry birds are reared under scavenging conditions.

Despite rapid development of intensive poultry production in the private sector, per capita availability of poultry meat (2.87 kg/annum; BBS 1989) and egg (21 eggs/annum; Huque & Stem, 1993) is still very low. This is largely due to lower productivity of the indigenous birds reared under scavenging conditions. This led researchers to put their efforts on identifying the problems faced by the poultry farmers and recommending some suggestions to overcome them. The theme has been explored through three major questions: What is the present status of poultry production in Bangladesh? What are the problems faced by the poultry farmers in the country? What are the ways to overcome those problems? Poultry in Bangladesh plays a pivotal role in the economy of the country that directly involves about 85% of peoples who live in the rural area. Bangladesh has a long historical record of poultry rearing under traditional backyard farming. In 1935 improved variety of birds were first imported from foreign countries by the Government. In 1947, six poultry farms were setup in different locations in the country for supplying hatching eggs and chicks (Reneta Statistical Year Book, 2005). After that, improved variety breed like White Leghorn, RIR, etc. from the western country like USA were imported by the Bangladesh government for multiplication and distribution to rural poultry raiser. The commercial poultry raising

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started in the country in a smaller scale, which brought economic return to the distressed women and unemployed youth along with some interested semi-urban and urban poultry raisers to meet the growing demand of eggs and meat. In 1964, a commercial poultry farm, Eggs and Hens Ltd., was established by the Late Mr. Ekramul Hossain, which could be recognized as a mother poultry industry in the private poultry sector. After the liberation of Bangladesh, BIMAN Bangladesh Airlines, started a commercial poultry farm in the name of Biman Poultry Complex at Savar, Dhaka with a contractual agreement with Poultry Breeding Farm of Canada for catering their own flying services and as well as transferring the commercial poultry farming technology to the farmers. The NGO’s, espec ially BRAC, has developed rural poultry model for the poor farmers that actually stimulated poultry rearing activities in rural areas in 1983. In early nineties, a number of private parent stock farms started their operation to produce commercial day old broiler and layer chicks (Reneta Statistical Year Book, 2005). All the literature shows that poultry is such an item, which can contribute massively to our country’s GDP if this industry can be able to make skilled human resources. Nevertheless, lack of adequate infrastructure is the main scarce of this sector.

2. RATIONALE OF THE STUDY The Government is facing a huge imbalance between import and export trade. That is why government is searching few sectors that will be able to generate more revenue or save some foreign currency for the sake of the smooth mobility of the country. Poultry is one of the important sectors for Bangladesh, which can manage more earnings if this industry is properly organized. Poultry sector is facing many problems like scarcity of skilled human resources, lack of technological expertise; inadequate poultry rearing management etc. That is why, Bangladesh is trying to develop its unskilled human resources into semi skilled or skilled so that they can contribute to this industry and compete in the local and the global

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market. This paper tries to unearth the real situation of the poultry sector in Bangladesh and at the end; the researchers set some recommendations to overcome the problems faced by this industry.

3. OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY In the light of the development of the poultry sector in Bangladesh particularly, the objectives of the study are @ To explore the present status of the poultry sector in Bangladesh @ To unearth the problems faced by this industry, and @ To suggest some recommendations for the development of the poultry sector in Bangladesh

4. SCOPE AND METHODOLOGIES OF THE STUDY This paper presents some results of field survey that was conducted in 2007. Data and information relating to this study were collected from both the primary and the secondary sources. Primary data relates to different commercial poultry farms that are established in the selected sample areas. The study covered three regions of Bangladesh i.e. Chittagong, Comilla and Feni on the basis of purposive sampling method. The total sample respondents were 60 including 10 commercial poultry farmer s and 50 poultry workers. The nonprobability sampling technique was used to select the sample farmers and workers. The researchers selected six villages - Sonapur & Champaknagar of Feni, Madaiya & Gazipur of Comilla and Gahira & Kadurkhil of Chittagong to cover 10 farms and within these 10 farms, researchers took 50 workers as a sample. Personal interviews and field investigation techniques were adopted in collecting the primary data and information from the sample areas. A structured questionnaire was used for collecting the primary data. The secondary

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data were collected from different published documents such as Survey reports, Five Year Plans, and Statistical Yearbooks. Further, various publications of national and international organizations like NGO Forums, CODEC, DFID, NRI etc were collected. In the process of analysis of collected data various statistical tools like weighted averages, percentages, tables, graphs and diagrams were applied in order to make the study worthy, informative, and useful for the purposes.

5. ANALYSIS OF FINDINGS 5.1 Poultry Production Systems As per rigorous discussion in the XX world poultry congress at Savar organized by FAO, the paper presenter has discussed the poultry production system of Bangladesh in the following ways1. Crossbred rural scavenging production: White Leghorn (WL), Rhode Island Red (RIR), Fayoumi are available in public sector poultry farms. These are mainly being used for improvement of local chickens through a crossbreeding program through chick, egg and pullet distribution, and cockerel exchange activities. At present, this program has got less priority in Bangladesh. 2. Smallholder resident scavenge chicken consisting of several birds: Native chickens are extensively raised in the backyard with night shelter and little supplementary feeding by rural people specially women and children; the males are normally raised for meat and breeding purposes, while the hens are raised for egg production and reproduction. An estimate showed that about 75 per cent of the eggs and 86 per cent of the meat is produced by this system. These birds are raised with little or no inputs and productivity is very low and irregular with an ave rage annual egg production 35–45 eggs weighing 33– 38 gm (Huque et al. 1990).

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3. Small commercial rural farming with pure line improved breeds: This system of production is one of the main activities of public sector with collaborative program of Non-Government Organization (NGO) managed completely by the women. At the beginning, this type of birds was used for the semi-scavenging model developed with seven components for rural poultry development. Many small farmers transferred their farming from pure line stock to hybrid stock after having their improved skill. 4. Small commercial farming with imported hybrids chicks: The small farming commercial producers receive day-old chicks from local hatcheries or imported ones. A large number of youth and women have become small-scale poultry farmers in the vicinity of big cities. The youths receive training from Department of Livestock Services, Youth Training Centres and NGOs. This production system is expanding in the country with the improvement of skills of the small farmers. 5. Large commercial poultry based on hybrids day-old chicks: These commercial layer and broiler enterprises are expanding in the vicinity of the cities for catering egg and meat to the cities. Numbers of this type of industrial ventures are very few which produce only 4 per cent eggs and 2 per cent meat of total production of Bangladesh (Huque and Stem, 1993). Table 1. Chicken production systems No. of birds

Investment on 40days (Tk in app fig)

10 to 300

1,000-30,000

Small commercial farming

500 to 5000

45,000 – 450,000

Large commercial poultry agribusiness

More than 5000 Source: Field Survey

4,25000+

Systems Small commercial rural Farming

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5.2 Poultry Sector in Bangladesh Table 2: Growth of Commercial Poultry Particulars 1991 2000 2001 Layer Parent Stock 22.5 145 236 Day old chick per year 2025 1305 2124 0 0 Day old chick per week 38.9 250 408 Price of DOC* 16 27.78 23.26 Broiler Parent Stock 30 750 1062 Day old chick per year 3540 9000 1003 Day old chick per week 68 1730 1929 Price of DOC* 24.6 19.32 Source: Poultry Business Directory 2007

in Bangladesh (figure in thousand) Year 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 370 138 3330 1242 0 0 640 239 15.15 27.33

344 3096 0 595 28.21

212 1908 0 367 25.67

282 25380 488 35.20

1381 1952 1160 1639 2230 3153 21.09 17.09

2358 1641 3156 13.2

2292 1925 3702 24.46

2745 288225 5542 25.61

Note: Calculation is made based on parents stock (Imported & locally produced Parent Stock DOC).*DOC mean Day old Chicks

Layer Vs Broiler Parent Stock (in '000) 3000 2000 1000 0 Layer Parent Stock 91

2000

2001

Broiler Parent Stock 2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

Fig 1: Layer and Broiler Parent Stock From the above table it is eminent that the commercial poultry sector in Bangladesh is growing year after year. The parent stock of Layer is increasing at an average rate of 133% every year but some deviation is seen at 2003 and 2005 whereas in 2001, 2002, 2004 and 2006 the growth rate is 163%, 157%, 249% and 133% respectively. On the contrary, a consistent growth rate of 125% is seen in case of broiler parent stock.

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Layer Vs Broiler day Old Chick Per Year ('000) 400000 200000 0 Layer Day old chick per year 91

2000

2001

2002

Broiler Day old chick per year 2003

2004

2005

2006

Fig 2: Layer Vs Broiler day Old Chick Per Year The average growth rate in case of Layer day old chick per week is 133% except deviation in the year of 2003 and 2005. Nevertheless, in case of broiler day old chick per week the growth rate is consistently 125% on an average but no deviation is seen. It is also eminent that the demand for broiler chicken is consistently increasing every year. Price of Layer Vs Broiler Day Old Chicks 40 30 20 10 0 Layer Price of DOC 91

2000

2001

Broiler Price of DOC 2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

Fig 3: Price of Layer Vs Broiler Day Old Chicks Moreover the variation in prices every year in case of layer da y old chicks is very much inconsistent whereas for broiler day old chicks it seems to be consistent enough for the last two years. 5.3 Development of poultry Industry in Bangladesh Poultry sector hopes to raise its annual turnover to Tk 10,000 crore from Tk 4,000 crore through adoption of improved technology and increasing local consumption. During the XX World Poultry Congress at Savar organized by FAO, leaders and experts of the sector have

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sought more policy and fiscal supports from the government to give a further boost to the sector. The supports sought in the forms of policy guidelines for poultry sector, 30 percent cash incentive like that given to agro products, extension of tax exemption up to 2015 and massive campaigns for raising domestic consumption. Sources linked to the World Poultry Science Association-Bangladesh Branch said the annual value of per capita consumption of broiler meat and eggs is $622 million in Bangladesh while the per capita meat consumption is 1.9 kilogram. However, the per capita meat consumption in Pakistan is 3.9 kg, Indonesia 3.8 kg, the Philippines 6.8 kg, China 5.4 kg, Thailand 14 kg, Malaysia 33.3 kg, Hong Kong 57.5 kg and Japan 13.8 kg. Experts attributed the low protein consumption in Bangladesh to general misconception among people about broiler chicken. Negative campaign against poultry birds cost the industry an estimated Tk500 crore in first six months of 2004 and led to closure of 1000 to 1500 farms, industry people claimed leaders of the poultry association said now about 40 to 50 lacs people are involved with this sector which has an investment of Tk 6,000-7,000 crore. The sector must achieve international standard through adoption of new technology, which will reduce cost of production and ensure quality of meat and eggs. The farmers, especially the smaller ones, need to be acquainted with the latest technology through exhibitions and seminars, they felt. They observed that there has been remarkable use of modern technology in the breeding sector that adopted environment controlled housing, automated feeding and drinking systems, computer controlled incubators and sophisticated diagnostics. About 100 per cent of grand parent stock and 60 per cent of parent stock are now being raised locally in environment-controlled housing, the association estimates. The international poultry show, forth of its kind in Dhaka, saw participants from 38 countries exhibiting poultry techs, accessories and logistics in 114 stalls. The theme of the 4th international Poultry Show and Seminar 2005 is Poultry Industry in Bangladesh: Challenges and Opportunities where 36 papers had been selected from different authors from Australia,

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Bangladesh, Canada, Denmark, Ethiopia, India, Iran, New Zealand, Nigeria and Austria. President of WPSA told New Age that Bangladesh needs to ensure quality of meat, feed and eggs if she wants to explore export opportunities. “We are exporting 150 tonnes of poultry feed monthly to Assam of India for the last two months and looking to ship 2-3 lakh hatching eggs a week to Europe and Middle East shortly”. If quality can be ensured, the country has the potential to start exporting meat within next six to seven months. 5.4 Role of Government Some of the challenges in sustainable poultry development and management pertain to deciding the most appropriate institutional framework. One is the delineation of the respective roles of government and the private sector. Raising the level of capacity and responsiveness of government poultry management agencies carrying out the ir role and functions to implement sub-sectoral strategies. One of the important roles of government is developing, with the private sector, a conducive and enabling policy environment for sustainable poultry development and management. The role of government in poultry development includes intervention in areas where the private sector participation is not appropriate or feasible. In certain circumstances, this may be the case with respect to the provision of physical infrastructure in strategic locations to support the integration of the poultry sector with other sectors of the economy. Where possible, such infrastructure should be financed by the private sector. In cases where government does provide essential infrastructure, this does not imply management of the facilities by government itself; the private sector may have a comparative advantage in this aspect. 5.5 Role of the Private Sector The private sector will be expected to play a major and increasing role in the poultry sector. Consistent with the basic principles outlined above and with lessons learned from past projects in the sector, the Bank will promote the role of the private sector in poultry rearing,

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feeding, hatching, processing, and marketing. NGOs are supporting for organizing poultry communities, enhancing their awareness of resource management approaches, developing community self-reliance, and coordinating ecosystem-wide resource management plans and systems.

6. PROBLEMS OF POULTRY MARKETING IN BANGLADESH A rank analysis has been conducted based on the problems that influence on the development of poultry sector of Bangladesh. The factors considered as important during the interview with respondents are - lack of financial credit, inadequate modern poultry equipment, inadequate logistic support, lack of adequate poultry rearing knowledge, absence of government help and guidance etc. Table3: Problems faced by poultry farmers No. Problems 1 Inadequate modern poultry equipment 2 Absence of adequate marketing Knowledge 3 Lack of adequate poultry rearing knowledge 4 Lack of modern communication facilities 5 Lack of financial credit 6 Inadequate infrastructure and logistic support 7 Absence of government help and guidance 8 Lack of Private investment 9 Problem of getting Reasonable price 10 Expensive poultry feed ingredients

1=10 2=9 3=8 4=7 5=6 6=5 7=4 8=3 9=2 10=1 Total %

Ranks

230 36 40 21 12 20 12

9

2

2

384 11.20

2

140 36 24 28 30 35

8

9

8

4

322 9.39

7

150 63 48 21 30 15

4

6

10

3

350 10.20

4

45 32 28 30 30 20 12

8

6

281 8.19

10

70

290 72 16 21

6

10

4

3

4

1

427 12.45

1

160 54 56 56 24 15

8

3

2

2

380 11.08

3

140 63 32 35 30 10 12

6

10

3

341 9.94

5

130 81 40 28 18

15

8

4

337 9.83

6

80

36 40 28 36 35 16 12 12

2

297 8.66

9

90

45 48 49 30 15 16

6

311 9.07

8

5

Grand Total

8

6

6

3430 [Source: Field Survey]

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7. PROBABLE SUGGESTIONS TO OVERCOME These problems can be overcome if some steps are taken by the concerned authority. The main objectives are to develop huge number of unskilled people into semi skilled or skilled. There are probable steps suggested by the researchers by the opinion taken from various poultry farmers and relevant authorities. These are as follows. I. Government initiatives: To develop human resources to operate poultry sector effectively to compete locally and globally; government has to take major step like create institutions for training poultry farmers and businessmen, increasing infrastructure and financing. Government has to motivate the businessmen and their allied to come up for better training and education. II. To design Proper HRD planning for poultry farmers : Government authority should take the overall responsibility to make effective human resources through coordination of various agencies. This agency should monitor the co-ordination matter. Effective HR planning and coordination is equally significant for the private and the public sector in Bangladesh. Especially educational infrastructure should be updated based on need. In Bangladesh, there is lack of poultry training institutions, it should be more than that otherwise unskilled labor will never be able to meet up the future demand of protein through poultry sector. III. To arrange easy loan: Every organization like government, private financial institutions, NGOs, and foreign investors should come up to give micro credit to poultry sector. IV. To employ professional trainer: To generate the admirable flow of skilled human resources in poultry sector, professional trainer is mandatory for all. Professional trainer should be hire d from domestic or foreign sources to give technical knowledge, proper education, training, and motivations to the poultry farmers.

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V. To adapt appropriate Modern technology: A low-cost intensive or semi-intensive poultry technology should be initiate d for the sake of developing skilled human resource for the poultry industry. These sorts of projects should have technical capacity and ability of farmers to provide the required inputs exclusively from their own resources. VI. To arrange workshop, seminar, and live demonstration for rele vant Poultry workers : The relevant authority should arrange workshops, seminars, conferences, and live demonstrations for imparting training to the farmers regarding the latest knowledge of poultry and marketing. VII. To develop security situation: The relevant authority should improve the security situation for smooth supply of day old chicks, live birds movements, poultry accessories and equipment movements all over the country.

8. CONCLUDING REMARKS The role of poultry sector for developing human resources is enormous. Country like Bangladesh has great emergence to develop her human resources into efficient and effective basis for the domestic market to meet up the demand of protein. It is one of the substitutes in connection with the development of Bangladesh. Skilled human resources can be able to contribute to the society in a significant way in various sectors. There is extraordinary competition in free market economy. Everybody compete with their efficient human resource and increase their productivity, innovation of new products, ensures quality assurance and create new market positioning. Moreover, efficient human resources should be created from a good institution. Consequently, human resource development through good institutions should be given the top most preference in the poultry development process of Bangladesh.

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After maintaining all the recommendations, skilled human resources will be built so that they will be the key factors or contributors to develop the poultry sector and Bangladesh as well.

REFERENCES 1. Anonymous 1998 Food and nutrition guidelines for healthy adolescents, Ministry of health, New Zealand. 2. Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (2006), Statistical Year Book of Bangladesh. 3. Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (1996), Statistical Year Book of Bangladesh, Seventeenth Edition. 4. Bangladesh Bureau of Education Information and Statistics, www.banbeis.gov.bd. 5. Brammer, H., Asaduzzaman, M., and Sultan, P. (1996). “Effects of climate and sea level changes on the natural resources of Bangladesh”, in R.A. Warrick and Q.K. Ahmed (eds.), The Implications and Climate and Sea-Level Change for Bangladesh, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 143-203. 6. HDI, UNDP (1996): Human Development Index, United Nation Development Program –1996 7. Human Development Reports, UNDP, 2005. 8. Huque, Q.M.E. and Stem, C. (1993). Current status of poultry production and marketing system of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council/USAID/Checci & Company Consulting Int, Dhaka, Bangladesh. 9. Huque, Q.M.E., Emdadul, M.H. and Rigor, E.M. (1990), The Effect of Chicken Separation on the Productivity of the Hens and Chick. Asian Journal of Animal Science. Vol 3(No.2) 121–123 10. Hussain, S. (1997): Recent trends in the rural economy of Bangladesh poverty and development. Dhaka, Bangladesh. Institute of Development Studies Journal PP 216236. 11. Obaidul Ghani, 2005, ‘Poultry sector eyes Tk10,000cr business’, Business & Economy, http://www.bangladesh-web.com/news/view.php?hidDate=2005-03-12 12. Poultry Business Directory 2007 (A publication of poultry: Kha mar Bichitra) 13. Reneta Statistical Year Book, 2005 14. Statistical Bulletin Bangladesh 2003 Bangladesh Bureau of statistics, July, pp. ix-x 15. Statistical Yearbook of Bangladesh 2000 published June 2002, 21st edition, pp. 395, 450, 581, 592, 595. 16. The New Age, March 12, 2005. 17. Website of Food and Agricultural Organization(FAO) 18. www.worldbank.org

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