The Deputy Director of the National Service Authority, Major Moses Kpeungu has stated that plans are afoot to modernise the National Service Farms to boost their commercial viability as part of the agenda to support the government in enhancing agriculture as an attractive sector to the youth.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with UniversNews after a site visit with a team led by the UG School of Veterinary Medicine, Major Kpeungu intimated the project is being supported by the state to raise close 100,000 birds in the short to medium term from the 2,000 capacity that was in last year whilst adding up some livestock to diversify the output to meet the demand from the public.
”The model farm is a partnership between the government of Ghana and development partners like the Mastercard Foundation, designed to mainstream commercial agriculture as an attractive career path for the youth. We plan to raise capacity to hold over 100,000 birds for meat and egg production to support the ‘Feed Ghana’ agenda, reduce dependence on poultry imports, and cut our food import bill. This venture creates thousands of jobs along the value chain, reducing pressure on the central government, and demonstrates that innovative agriculture is the new goldmine for creating young, successful Ghanaian entrepreneurs.”
Major Kpeungu also revealed that the farm currently has some 500 stock of the birds sourced under the flagship Nkok) Nkitinkiti policy on a trial basis to be able to tap into the potential of the vision by the state, in addition to the set-up of a meat processing facility to help bring down the prices of products for the ordinary Ghanaian consumers.
“As part of diversifying the farm project being handled by the NSA, there have been some concrete discussions from officials of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to add up the ‘Nkok) Nkitinkiti’ breed of birds being raised by the sector Ministry to the stock at the farm as part of the vision- currently, through that arrangement, the farm has taken delivery of 500 chicks for the pilot of that policy as well.
“Farm management has decided to add up some pig stocks too to complement the poultry population in the short to medium term to also get healthy pork products for the patronizing public who have shown faith in acquiring our products ahead of the festive period and as such, we are also preparing 20,000 broilers to be available to potential buyers over the period to boost our Internally Generated Funds at the facility in the coming weeks.”
Major Kpeungu added that securing infrastructure is key to ensuring their commercial longevity and driving down consumer prices, confirming plans for a new facility:
The good news is that through the support of our development partners and government, we are setting up a meat processing factory on the farm to add more innovation to our existing processes which would be onboard probably in mid-2026 to expand our operations for the large scale commercialization Management wants to mainstream over the coming years.”
The farm visit was part of a two-day seminar for poultry Farmers organized by the School of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Ghana and the Department of Animal Science to enlighten them on how to conduct animal management practices and disease control methods as the government moves to mainstream poultry production as part of it’s agenda in the coming years.
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Story by Sika Togoh |univers. ug. edu. gh
Edited by Deborah Owusu
