Still battling with the current hike in prices of feeds, poultry farmers in Lagos State are now finding it difficult to dispose of wastes from their farms.
The farmers are now spending much of their incomes to dispose wastes.
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Although, poultry experts believe the challenge for now is mainly for farmers in Lagos because of the metropolitan nature of the city, farmers in other big cities should also brace up.
Some Lagos-based poultry farmers told Daily Trust on Sunday that the challenge is now forcing some farmers out of business in the state.
Some of the farmers called for government’s intervention in recycling wastes.
A poultry farmer, Mr. Joel Oduware, said some poultry farmers in the state were closing shops due to the problem.
“The disposal of poultry wastes is a very big issue to poultry farmers in Lagos. Most farms in the state are closing shops because of this.
“We have very big issues with the disposal of poultry wastes in this state, the government needs to come back with the project on poultry waste management scheme,’’ he said.
Oduware said the problem was peculiar to farmers in Lagos, unlike other states that have adequate lands to process wastes into organic fertiliser.
“In rural areas in Ogun and Oyo and states in the northern part of the country, poultry farmers do not have issues with waste disposal but actually generate extra income from them.
“What they do is that they bury the poultry wastes because of the land space available and generate organic fertilisers from them and sell them to crop farmers.
“The reverse is the case in Lagos because you cannot just go dig up anywhere to bury poultry wastes, waste management has pushed a lot of poultry farmers out of business,’’ he told the News Agency of Nigeria in Lagos.
An Epe-based poultry farmer, Mrs. Folake Aina, said she had spent a million naira in the recent past to dispose her poultry wastes.
“Last time, I called big septic tanker operators to clear the wet waste because nobody will take that. After they collected 20 trips, I told them to stop. Now, I tell nearby crop farmers to come with their packers and they pack as much as possible for free.
“Some of the farmers packed as much as 5,000 bags, loaded them in a trailer and took them to their farms outside Lagos.
“We have not been able to fully clear the pens, imagine the waste of 10,000 birds in one place for two years,” she said.
The Lagos chairman of the Poultry Association of Nigeria (PAN), Godwin Egbebe, confirmed the challenge among farmers but said the association had begun a move to address it.
He said while some farmers had to find ways to evacuate the wastes, on his farm, the wastes are mixed with sawdust, bagged and sold off at a cheap price to those who want to plant flowers.
Experts suggest ways out
Mrs. Folake Aina, a Lagos farmer, advised that to avoid spending much on waste disposal all the time, farmers could buy a land solely for disposing poultry wastes.
She said another option which is somehow costly, is for the farmers to convert wastes to bio-gas.
“When dry, we can convert the poultry wastes into bio-gas to generate light. The manure I have on my farm can light up a village and you know poultry farmers use light all the time. In the evening, night, they need minimal light for the birds to eat.
“That bio-gas can power the lighting system so it will reduce their spending on diesel. It can be used as cooking gas and also power the farm. This is an option which can cost money but also save the farmers’ money,” she said.
She said the other option is to dry the waste to become manure. A dryer will squeeze out the water and manure can be pelletized or converted to powder and sold.
“From my experiment, manure assists crop farms better than fertilizers. We planted and use manure in a part, fertilizer in the other. The farm where manure is used does better and this proves manure is a very good form of fertilizer and it can fetch money for farmers,” she added.
She wants the relevant government agencies in Lagos to support them by organizing a sensitization programmes on how to go about the bio-gas.
The Lagos State PAN chairman, Godwin Egbebe, said an option that would be good for farmers would be to have access to processing plants that will be converting the wastes to wealth.
To this end, he said a proposal had been submitted to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to assist in procuring processing plants which will turn poultry wastes to wealth.
“We need drying machines in four locations within the seven zones in Lagos. We can start with four and it will reduce our problem. And from there to other parts of the country,” he said.
We are aware of the challenge – Lagos govt
The Lagos State Ministry of Agriculture said it was aware of the waste disposal challenge which a senior official in the ministry said was being addressed.
The official, who requested not to be named because he was not authorised to speak to the press, said all over the world, the use of organic manure in crop cultivation is being promoted and chicken waste is a major source of organic manure.
“Crop farmers all over the country have shown immense interest in getting chicken wastes for crop cultivation, however, chicken wastes require curing and moisture reduction before use,’’ he said.
He said the agric ministry through the FADAMA project had facilitated the procurement of chicken waste dryers for farmers to make transportation of dry manure to vegetable farms easier, though, some farmers said they had not seen anything as such from the government.
The ministry official said private investors had an opportunity to take up wastes, cure, dry and sell them as organic manure to crop farmers, adding that poultry farmers can make waste disposal faster by separating biodegradable and non-biodegradable wastes.
“Bio gas production is another waste disposal method the ministry has promoted among farmers. Some farmers have put this into practice. It is of note that in a state like Lagos with limited land resources, waste management is challenging and new technology to manage and process it within a confined area of limited space is being looked into,” he said.
A top management member in the Lagos State Environmental Protection Agency (LASEPA) said the agency only intervenes in poultry farm waste disposal issues when their output becomes an environmental nuisance and endangers the health of the community.
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