Kano’s oldest abattoir established in the Dala area of the metropolis about 58 years ago has been serving the meat consumption needs of people of the state amidst space constraints, inadequate facilities and a filthy environment, Daily Trust on Sunday reports.
The main abattoir of Kano Metropolis located in Dala Local Government Area (LGA) of Kano State is one of the oldest in the state from where meat is processed and distributed to the 44 LGAs of the state, as well as neighbouring states and countries.
However, the abattoir which has been in existence since 1963, Daily Trust on Sunday observed, is too small to process enough meat to meet the daily consumption demand of the state’s growing population.
When our correspondent visited the abattoir recently, it was a beehive of activities with thousands of youths going about their respective businesses across the value chain of meat processing with no fewer than 80,000 people eking out a living in it.
Some of the users of the facility who spoke to our reporter lamented the state of infrastructure in the abattoir, saying the daily increase in the number of users had added undue pressure on its available resources thereby making the place unkempt and below standard.
One of the leaders of the butchers who spoke to Daily Trust on Sunday alleged that the last time the abattoir got assistance from the state government was during the administration of former Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso who provided the association of butchers with 100 tricycles for the distribution of meat, and that since then no effort had been made to scale up their business in line with global best practices.
He, however, said Gov Abdullahi Umar Ganduje sent a delegation from the Ministry of Works to map out an area at Kara for the construction of a state-owned abattoir, but that after the group of foreign engineers came and took measurements and drew a plan, nothing was heard again about the project.
He, therefore, urged the government to invest in the business of meat production by building a world class abattoir, saying on daily basis the management of the abattoir generated over N400,000 from taxes.
He explained that, “This abattoir was built by the native authority under the Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello (Sardauna), in 1963. When it was built there was little understanding of its benefits and as a result it was sold out to private investors.
“In this abattoir on daily basis not less than 500 animals are butchered: for each cow we pay N1,000; camel (N1,000); sheep and goat (N100) as tax to the owners of the abattoir. If you sum up these taxes you will notice that we pay about N400m every month to the management of the abattoir.”
Reflecting on the state of the facility on take-off about 57 years ago, another butcher, Alhaji Basiru Abdullahi Kara, said, “When this place was opened newly it had state-of-the-art facilities, but some of the machines, because of cultural and religious practices, were rejected and thus were not installed.”
He identified lack of a cold room for the storage of unsold meat as one of the major concerns in the facility.
He urged the state government to intervene by subsidising the cost of animal feed, saying doing so would help in crashing the cost of animals.
Meanwhile, our correspondent gathered that the veterinary unit at the abattoir bars at least 10 cows from being slaughtered every week on health grounds.
The Head of Inspection from the state’s Ministry of Agriculture, Dr Salisu Muahmmad Inuwa, stated this while responding to questions from our correspondent at the facility.
Our correspondent reports that a team of eight veterinary doctors deployed to the abattoir are responsible for ensuring that the meat products served the public across the state are healthy and consumable.
Dr Inuwa said his team conducted tests on any animal that was brought to the abattoir and that any that was found unfit for consumption was rejected.
He said, “Apart from the tests we conduct at the entrance, we also move around to inspect the meat during processing, and sometimes in the process we condemn some parts of the meat, and sometimes the entire animal. In fact, every week we condemn no fewer than 10 cows in this facility.”
Asked what happens to the owners of the condemned animals, he said initially the government was compensating to cushion the effect, but that due to the economic hardship at the moment, the compensation had stopped, but that he hoped it would be restored soon.
