CBN, Universities Collaborate to Boost Poultry Production

The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Godwin Emefiele, has said the apex bank is collaborating with some Universities as part of a pilot to boost poultry production in the country to run a university-based Poultry Revival Programme.
Emefiele said the intervention in the sub-sector has become necessary to produce chicken meat and egg to reduce importation and close the existing demand and supply gap; raise a new crop of agropreneurs in modern poultry production; provide infrastructure that would support the sustainable production of poultry; as well as reduce pressure on foreign exchange demand through import substitution by local poultry production.
The CBN Governor who spoke at an interactive session with vice-chancellors of universities on the proposed project to boost poultry production, said the CBN would commit human, material and financial resources to monitoring both the disbursement and utilization of funds in a robust and verifiable manner.
He said the sector currently lack access to low cost, long tenured finance, which though is not peculiar to the industry but must be resolved.
He said the Nigerian poultry faces high production costs, safety concerns due to lack of sanitary controls and technical constraints in processing and marketing, stressing that production costs are generally high due to lack of an integrated and automated industrial poultry sector.
He said poultry producers lacked reliable access to inputs including chicks and feed as well as high costs of veterinary services.
The CBN governor also expressed worry that an estimated 1.2 million metric tonnes of poultry meat was being smuggled into the country from the neighboring Benin Republic by some unscrupulous Nigerians, describing the situation as unfortunate.
He said that the CBN was ready to put an end to it, adding that the intervention was directly in conformity with the apex bank’s resolve to diversify the economy, be a catalyst for job creation and inclusive economic growth.
The CBN governor said, “our main intermediate objective is to ensure that poultry production is increased as well as end the smuggling of poultry products into Nigeria”.
According to him, “In order to ensure the attainment of our goals, therefore the CBN would be committing considerable human, material and financial resources to monitoring both the disbursement and utilisation of these funds in a robust and verifiable manner.
“Participating institutions will be required to submit periodic returns on disbursements as well as an analysis of the impacts of the Fund they received.

“The CBN will also undertake regular on and off-site checks to ascertain the veracity of the reports received. Therefore, I respectfully enjoin you and your institutions to help us in achieving these goals by ensuring that these funds are deployed in an effective and efficient manner.”
Represented by CBN Deputy Governor, Monetary Policy, Dr. Joseph Nnanna, he said the poultry sub-sector was the most commercialised of all Nigeria’s agricultural sub-sectors.
He said the sub-sector contributes about 25 per cent of agricultural GDP to the economy with a current net worth of about N1.6 trillion.