By Kellen Owente
Robert Sserwanga, an agricultural expert, has urged farmers to invest more in poultry farming if they want to earn profits from it.
“In poultry we do not save money by not spending it, but we save it by doing the right thing, which means investing more in the well-being of the birds,” Sserwanga said.
He explained that investing in key areas like their food, light, clean water and warmth are important for their health. “Chicken must be fed properly to perform optimally and to be healthy. Some people feed them on anything, which is why they end up stagnant and cannot earn you money,” he added.
Dr Samuel Sewagudde, a nutritionist, said failure to maintain the health of the chicken’s digestive system (gut) is one of the biggest mistakes farmers make while rearing them because maintaining them is the main source of income from poultry.
He mentioned that the gut is very important because it is comprised of mechanisms that use the food given to the bird, hence a high return once it is sold.
“Most farmers have failed to understand that once you destabilise the system by feeding the birds with foreign materials, including stones, dust, worms and particles, you are likely to register massive losses,” Sewagudde said.
Some of the nutrients that are meant to increase the bird’s body weight, according to Sewagudde, usually come out through their droppings because there was no opportunity to break it down.
“In the flock, you will see under-weight broilers. At three weeks, broilers are supposed to weigh around 196g, but most weigh only about 70 grams at this stage. This will eventually affect how much the birds fetch,” he said. 
