YAP proposal #392: Safety and Hygiene in Goat Farming (Nuaman Alam, Pakistan)

In Pakistan, a developing country, there is no concept of food safety and its links to farming. We are in dire need of purity, as for as food farm and culture is a concern to us, so we students came up with an idea to do are bit to eradicate such evils from the country.

We are postgraduate students of food safety and control at UVAS Lahore, Pakistan. Our team will consist of two members: M Nuaman Aslam and Zeerak Hassan.

Livestock is the backbone of our GDP as in all developing countries. In Pakistan, the goats are everywhere and they are known as poor man’s cow. They are raised for meat, milk, skin, fibre, and pelts.

Each of these products varies from region to region and largely determined by ecological and economic factors.

In Punjab, its main purpose is to get milk and meat. The goat wealth is in the hands of poor people and its farming carried out as a way of life instead on commercial scale. Entrepreneurs do not operate their units at efficient levels due to a lack of knowledge about modern farm practices.

They need training and they need acknowledgement that the asset they have in their backyard is unique. It is a way to get more profit with modern management techniques and following food safety standards. No efforts have ever been made to alter their practices.

The goat owners can commercialize their farming units by adopting modern technology. Small farmers do integration farming in some way but they not know the actual integration meaning.

Safety of milk and meat is the big issue of all around the world. In Pakistan, there is zero concept of food safety at farm level or I must say there is no concept of preventive approach. In our project we focus the local farmer to provide best trainings and to education.

The Project

Operational Capacity

The farm will start production with 50 goats. The limit of 50 goats has been imposed on the farm because a very large flock would be difficult to manage. The farm would focus on rearing of young stock for fattening and marketing. Goats from aged less than one year of age will be purchased and resold in the market after a fattening period of 120 days.

Potential Markets

Target market would be in the areas where breeding is being undertaken as well as major cities like Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Peshawar, etc. In addition to local markets, there is an enormous export potential to Middle Eastern countries.

Process Production Flow

Animals selected for fattening should be of less than one year of age. During this age the daily weight-gain capacity is also better particularly in goat.

Breed Selection

The farmers should not only select good quality breed which can bring better results for fattening and milk but also select most suitable animals from the selected breed. Through better management, the weight gain of these selected breeds would be higher.

Project Budget

A detailed financial model has been developed to analyze the commercial viability of Goat Fattening Farm. Various cost and revenue related assumptions along with results of the analysis are outlined in this section.

Project cost;

Description	unit	Cost (USD)
Shed for 50 kids	600 sq. ft	1,500
Isolation pen for 5 kids	60 sq. ft	100
Store	200 sq. ft	400
Machinery and equipment	—-	800
Young kids purchase	50	2,200
Total cost		5,000

Farm Structure

Shed, courtyards, hospital/clinic, office, feed mill, store, and separate pens.

Traditional backyard rearing and extensive grazing in big herds are still practiced. Advanced technologies like compound feed and kid fattening are seldom conducted.

Goat farming plays an important role as they do not require costly inputs. They are the main source of animal protein for people particularly in rural areas. Goat farming should be based on rational exploitation of local resources, never sacrificing the environment.

Conclusion

My innovation about goat farming is to make a modal farm for farmers with results on the scientific basis. In which all the standards for a good meat and milk will be followed. And ultimately not only national level but also at international level I can get recognition about meat and milk hygiene.

Blogpost and picture submitted by Nuaman Alam (Pakistan): numan.rana24[at]gmail.com

The content, structure and grammar are at the discretion of the author only.

 

This post is published as proposal #392 of “YAP” – our “Youth Agripreneur Project”.

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