Nigeria empowers 17,000 Youths in Animal Husbandry
By Ene Okwanihe, Abuja
The National Agricultural Land Development Authority NALDA has commenced the implementation of the National Young Farmers Scheme by empowering seventeen thousand youth in Animal Husbandry.
The Executive Secretary and CEO of NALDA, Prince Paul Ikonne disclosed this at a media briefing in Abuja Nigeria’s capital.
Prince Ikonne said the first phase of the scheme which is Animal husbandry has 17,000 youth drawn from Imo, Abia, Cross River and Oyo states receiving Rabbits to start rabbit farms that have the potential of yielding an average profit of one hundred thousand naira monthly.
While highlighting the benefits of Rabbit farming Prince Ikonne said though rabbit farming is not popular in Nigeria, the meat, Hyde, urine and excrement are in high demands.
“A lot of people don’t know the potentials, the benefits and the money they can make from rearing rabbit. Rabbit has an entire value chain; nothing is a waste when farming rabbit. From the meat, the hide, which is the skin, the dunks and the urine, they are all money-making machine”
Prince Ikonne stated that the scheme was a partnership between the government and the farmers as the government would serve as off-takers.
He noted that aside the nutritional value of the meat which is white meat, the urine and the dunk is a good source of fertilisers as they would collect them and make it available to people in need of it for fertilisers.
On the procedure of collecting the urine and dunk, he said the rabbit cages provided to the youths was designed in such a way that it automatically collects the dunks and urine.
On income generation he said, “The program is very simple, from the first day the farmer start rearing rabbits, they start making money from that day, from the collection of the urine, to the collection of the dungs which will be used as fertilizer, their money will keep accumulating, at the end of the month, we’ll pay them based on the liters and kilogram of what they have submitted to NALDA office at their various states before the off-taker takes it,” he explained.
“you can see that the benefits of rearing rabbits, before we go into the processing the sale of the animal itself is another means of income, the meat is one of the best meat because it’s white meat and it’s good for those that are having cholesterol issues, that also will be source of income, then the hide which is the skin is also in high demand for designers” he further explained
The Executive Secretary further explained that Rabbit farms are easy to run as it does not involve much modality.
“The beauty about this is that it doesn’t have much hazard, it doesn’t require so much, rabbit virtually eats everything and it doesn’t require too much space, so you can farm it at the smallest space you have in your house whether you are a landlord or a tenant and it doesn’t litter the environment”
For interested persons, Prince Ikonne called on youth across the country to key into the scheme by applying on the agencies official website www.nalda.ng and since the program was community-based, interested persons could also visit NALDA offices in the various states to apply.
Confidence Okwuchi
