Rwanda Agriculture Board (RAB) targets monthly production of 100,000 tonnes of chicken meat in the next five years.
The target was announced yesterday during the meeting that brought together RAB officials and poultry farmers.
The Head of Animal Resources Department at RAB, Dr. Christine Kanyandekwe said farmers have to embrace modern chicken farming and ensure chicken’s good health in order to increase the production.
“The first thing is to embrace modern farming and prevent diseases. Feeding chickens with appropriate feeds will also help increase the production,” she said.
Dr. Kanyandekwe said the country produced a total of 7,000 tonnes of eggs last year, the production they also target to increase in future.
Magezi Mutimura, a chicken farmer, said that they still have challenges like costly feeds and lack of medication for their chickens but head of Poultry Farmers Association, Jean Claude Ruzibiza, said that problems have been solved.
“We encountered different challenges in the past including some chicken diseases and lack of chicks but we have recently acquired many incubators and we are set to produce many chicks to the extent we will export some,” he said.
Statistics from RAB show that meat production reached 116,000 tonnes in 2016 up from 86,000 tonnes in 2015.src:igihe
