By Oliver Ryan & Anupa Pant

The poultry sector in Nepal carries a value tag of USD 180 million and contributes 3.3 per cent to the country's GDP. Despite its significant contribution to the Nepali economy it bears a subdued profile; write Oliver Ryan and Anupa Pant.Nepal has some 50 feedmills producing 450000 tonnes of feed per annum for a production of around 50 million broilers per annum from 5000 broiler per annum from 5000 farms. Cobb 500 is the dominant breed.

The country is considered to be selfsufficient in poultry products and in poultry feeds although a significant proportion of the feed ingredients e.g. grains and protein meals are imported from India.The total direct employment in the organized commercial sector is estimated to be 70,000, and provides a livelihood to thousands of households. The poultry sector has been growing at a rate of 10 per cent per annum over the last decade.The Nepalese broiler industry is divided into three distinct sectors, namely feed, DOC supply and broiler grow-out as distinct to an integrated model common internationally. There is limited processing with 99 per cent of the birds sold live.

In May 2010, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, reviewed the poultry industry in Nepal including a lead firm diagnostic, farmer/supplier diagnostic, benchmarking and institutional mapping. The results of the diagnostic highlighted that the current waste (inefficiency) in the industry is calculated to be USD 32 million, if Nepal's performance is compared to an achievable international benchmark performance. It is recognized that the largest inefficiencies in the industry exist in the broiler growout sector, due to its structure and size, dominated by small in-efficient farmers. Grower farms are typically 1,000 birds with the largest at 150,000 birds. It is assumed that there are effectively 5,000 commercial farms in Nepal supplying 80 per cent of the birds

 IFC identified the key barriers to improving the commercial broiler sector in Nepal as follows: while maize is available locally, protein meals, fishmeal, vitamins, minerals and addictives are imported from India. Adequate quantities of feed ingredients of acceptable quality (particularly dry maize) are often not available in local markets resulting in variable quality feeds, despite Nepal having some modern feedmills. Productivity of parent stock is generally poor and variable per flock.

Day old chick (DOC) prices are often high due to large cycles in broiler meat prices and DOC supply. DOC quality is regarded as the main problem by broiler growers and much of that is due to dehydration of DOC due to long delivery times of up to 48 hours. Boiler farmers do not understand the importance of bio-security and all-in, allout systems are often compromised. The lack of integration exacerbates this as farmers (wrongly) think multi-age flocks will improve cash flows.

There is a lack of access to technical knowledge and services. About 95 per cent of the poultry farmers do not have any formal training of farm management (biosecurity, housing and ventilation, feed and water management, livestock management and disease) and the service function from PS farms and feed mills is only now being developed. Oliver Ryan, an ex IFC Poultry Specialist, who undertook the industry diagnostic for IFC, stated that IFC's global knowledge of the poultry industry enabled it to identify key issues that needed addressing but more importantly could quantify and prioritise the benefits from the implementation of a corrective action plan and could assist the industry identify suitable specialists to assist with this. IFC strengthens sector To address the issues that are impacting the industry, IFC has launched a threeyear poultry supply chain strengthening project in Nepal. This project will assist three lead firms (covering two PS operations and two feedmills) and 3,000 poultry farmers.

The lead firms will have the capacity for supplying more than 40 per cent of Nepal's feed and some 30 per cent of the DOC demand. These lead firms have direct business relationships with feed/DOC agents nationwide. This relationship will be used to disseminate technical skills and services. Technical specialists in feed production, nutrition, livestock and disease have been contracted to assist the lead firms in improving their production efficiencies. The first two lead firms to join the project were Avinash Hatcheries, producers of Cobb 500 broilers and Hyline layer DOC's and ProbioTech Industries Limited (Nimbus), a major feedmiller. About 95 per cent of small-scale poultry entrepreneurs do not have any formal training on farm management. Sustaining profitably after two/three batches is a recurring challenge. We are happy to join hands with IFC to build a pool of trainers to provide services to poultry entrepreneurs, says Anand Bagaria, Managing Director, ProbioTech Industries Pvt Ltd. The project will train broiler growers in all aspects of broiler production through the employment and training of 12 local veterinarians. These veterinarians will then train 3,000broiler farmers over a period of three years, with the aim of directly impacting the management of 40 per cent of Nepal's broiler production. Lead firms will be used to arrange broiler farmer training sessions.

There will be a gender specific outreach component of the project, as well as a dealer/retailer component (with focus on bird handling, waste management and food safety). The aim is to improve feed, DOC chick quality and grower performance to reduce mortality by two per cent and reduce FCR by 0.2:1 over the term of the project. The project performance will be measured by the improvement in liveability and FCR over a baseline performance that is being carefully established on a sample of farms and will be monitored by an independent assessor. It is recognised that the largest inefficiencies in the industry exist in the broiler grow-out sector, due to its structure and size, dominated by small farmers, said Brad Roberts, Operations Officer, IFC. IFC is providing support to enhance productivity and efficiency improvements for about 3,000 broiler farms. He said that the IFC's role in increasing industry capability was hopefully a forerunner to IFC assisting with project finance to a growing industry. ï

(This article was published in Asian Poultry Magazine November/December 2011.)