The Ghana Chicken and Poultry Festival has been launched with a call on the government to initiate policies to address the challenges hindering the growth of the poultry sector.
The day's event, the third edition, is scheduled for July 1, 2023, and would be held at the Forecourt of the State House in Accra.
The National Chairman of the Ghana National Association of Poultry Farmers, Mr Victor Oppong, who made the call in Accra on Wednesday, said the poultry sector could serve as a catalyst and driver of economic growth if the challenges facing the sector were addressed.
He mentioned some of them as the high cost of feed, disease, poor hatchery facilities, contributing to the high cost of poultry production in the country.
Mr Oppong said the government could rely on poultry production for the economic transformation of the country as had been done in the US and other parts of the world.
"My appeal to the government is to pick up Poultry as a project for economic diversification," he stated.
Mr Oppong explained that Poultry had the potential of creating over a million jobs along the value chain to mitigate the unemployment challenges confronting the country over the years.
"It also has the potential to alleviate poverty through job creation," Mr Oppong stated.
Ghana in 2021 imported about 600,000 metric tonnes of frozen chicken estimated at $600 million.
He said Ghana has the potential of producing the country's poultry needs locally to reduce the importation of frozen chicken in the country, but could currently produce only 14 per cent of the national need.
The Deputy Minister of Food and Agriculture in charge of Livestock, Alhaji Hardi Tufeiru, in a speech read for him during the launch, commended Agrihouse Foundation for the programme.
He said the event was in line with the government's programme Rearing for Food and Jobs.
Alhaji Tufeiru said the government would continue to initiate programmes and policies to promote the poultry industry.
The Founder and Executive Director of Agrihouse Foundation, Ms Alberta Nana Akyaa Akosah, said the idea of the Ghana Chicken and Poultry Festival was borne out of the Livestock, Poultry and Fisheries Trade Show in 2019, to come out with solutions to alleviate the effects of scarcity in the poultry industry.
"It was in the course of executing the project that we noticed the growing challenges faced by Ghana's poultry farmers and, in response to that situation, we arrived at the idea of the Ghana Chicken Festival, in collaboration with the then USDA Ghana Poultry Project, " she stated.
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"Not only did we find that Ghana could sufficiently meet her poultry need, but that this could be done with additional health benefits too," she stated.
Ms Akosa said the local breeds contained Vitamin D and less toxin.
Ms Akosa stated that programmes outlined for this year's event include a knowledge-sharing panel conversation about the poultry industry, value chains, and the chicken recipe cooking competition, which is to use leaders of institutions and decision-makers as influencers in promoting the poultry industry, chicken meat sampling, exhibitions and networking and fun-filled programmes.
She said the programme would provide an opportunity to discuss measures to promote the local poultry industry and consumption, and encouraged corporate bodies to support the programme to sustain gains made in promoting local poultry
