Poultry farmers in Kiambu county have registered a cooperative society in the search for better prices for their products.
Kiambu County Poultry Farmers Cooperative Society coordinator Zachary Munyambu said 404 farmers from across the county have registered.
Speaking during a farmers' meeting in Thika, Munyambu said the members are already rearing 800,000 layers, 400,000 broilers and 200,000 local chickens.
The sacco targets 4,000 members.
Munyambu said the farmers registered the sacco after many frustrations.
“We now have strong bargaining power since we’ll be speaking in one voice,” he said.
Munyambu said chicken farmers have suffered loses due to the high cost of production and the influx of cheap imports from Uganda and South Africa.
He said due to the imports, eggs prices have plummeted from Sh280 to Sh180 per tray.
“Most poultry farmers are retirees who used their pension money to venture into farming but are now counting losses. Some have already deserted rearing. The unscrupulous cartels flooding the market with cheap imports have really hit us below the belt,” Munyambu said.
We decided to manufacture our own feeds to cut short the cost of production and to be guaranteed of the quality. A 70kg bag is selling at Sh2,500, therefore saving the farmers Sh500 on each bag.
He said production has been dropped in the county.
“We buy a 70kg bag of feed at Sh2,800 to Sh3,000 but despite the high cost, the feeds are of poor quality thus affecting production,” Munyambu said.
Greedy traders contaminate the feed, he said.
“They mix sunflower with charcoal, fishmeal with sand and maize meal with lime. This totally degrades the quality of the feeds.”
Sacco chairperson Ann Wanjiku said to address the of the high cost of feed and bad quality, the group will manufacture its own feed.
Thika Town MP Patrick Wainaina donated an incubator with a capacity of 1,000 eggs and a mixer to aid in their feed making.
The MP said the government must stop cartels from smuggling eggs into the country .