Accra, Nov. 3, GNA – The West Africa Food System Resilience Programme (FSRP) – a World Bank project under the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MOFA) – is to organise a week-long road show for the public to sample grown-in Ghana broiler chicken ahead of this year’s Farmers’ Day.
“The FSRP Chicken Road Show”, which is scheduled for Farmers’ Day Exhibition, would have selected beneficiary anchor farmers under FSRP grilling between 1000-2000 hygienic, nutritious and delicious locally bred chicken for sampling by sections of the public at no fee from tomorrow Monday to Thursday.
A news brief said the tasting exercises would start at 2pm each day at the FSRP grilling stand with an open invitation to the public.
It said state officials, parliamentarians, public figures, patriotic celebrities, schools, private organisations and interest groups would be invited to taste and support hygienic, nutritious, tasty, spicy and crispy locally raised chicken.
The brief said, “The FSRP Chicken Road Show” would be replicated in other regions immediately after the Farmers’ Day celebrations.
MOFA – FSRP Poultry Intensification Scheme (PIS).
As at 2021, imports of chicken and its products was in excess of $300 million.
MoFA – FSRP is, therefore, implementing the PIS aimed at revamping the local broiler industry.
An amount of $12.5m has been set aside from the World Bank funding for implementation of the FSRP to fund the PIS over a 5-year period.
Under the scheme, commercial anchor farmers and their smallholders are receiving support to produce, process and market at least two (2) million birds annually over the next five (5) years.
Beneficiaries are receiving input credit in the form of day-old chicks, feed supplies, as well as supplies of vaccines.
They are also being trained in best modern practices and climate-smart technologies within the poultry industry.
They will also be able to access matching grants to procure equipment to support post-production processing and cold storage equipment/ infrastructure.
The brief said the “The FSRP Chicken Road Show” therefore formed part of the implementation activities of the MOFA-FSRP Poultry Intensification Scheme for Ghanaians to sample healthy, hygienic and affordable grown-in-Ghana broiler birds.
It said in July 2024, some 22 commercial farmers were competitively selected from six regions – Ashanti, Bono, Volta, Greater Accra, Central and Eastern – to participate in the PIS.
The brief said since then, FSRP had facilitated input credit for eight of those anchor farmers by way of 360,500 day-old chicks, 911, 000 doses of vaccines (HBI, Lasota, Umboro 1 & 2) and 4.5kg of feed per bird – totalling 1,179,000 kg of feed.
It said all amounted to nearly 830,000 USD within four months (as at end October 2024), with the Poultry Intensification Scheme leading to the production of 400,000 birds.
The brief said media practitioners were invited to directly witness the entire process of producing homegrown broilers, from farm to fork.
“It commenced with the handover of day-old chicks to outgrowers in the Ashanti Region,” it said.
The brief said weeks after that, journalists were invited to witness the transportation of grown birds to processing facilities and followed through the entire processing routine from slaughtering, dressing, packaging, blast freezing and later delivered to retail shops and to consumers – all done under strict regulatory oversight.
It said the FSRP-produced broilers were raised under the prying eyes of an entire community of state regulatory bodies and experts.
The brief said monitoring teams made up of officials of Animal Production Directorate (APD-MOFA), the Veterinary Services Dept (VSD-MOFA), Regional/ District Departments of Agriculture and FSRP Social and Environmental experts and other regulatory officials inspected the poultry farms and processing facilities to ascertain their adherence to laid down industrial standards like feed quality, vaccination timeliness, bio-security protocols, stipulated weights and general healthcare of the birds.
GNA