The Poultry Association of Zambia has charged that load shedding is having a huge negative impact on the poultry industry in terms of production and business operations.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambian Business Times -ZBT on the impact load shedding has had on the poultry industry, Association Executive Manager Dominic Chanda warned that some players in the industry especially small scale farmers are scaling down on production or completely shutting down their businesses due to the high cost of doing business.
Chanda emphasized on the importance of electricity on production and business operations adding that electricity is like blood to the human body.
He added that some small-scale farmers using electricity for incubation and lighting purposes will have to discontinue the aforementioned services due to the high cost of alternative sources of energy.
He further reiterated that the cost of production amid loadshedding will go up at all levels in the poultry supply chain.
“Electricity is like blood to the human being so any disruption in the supply intends to have a negative effect in that some will have to scale down production because they cannot have power for a quiet number of hours. For others definitely, it’s the issue of shutting down completely. For those that are using power for example, small-scale farmers that are using power for incubation purposes the impact is that they cannot continue with their incubation services if they can’t find any alternative sources of energy,” he said.
“For those that are producing chickens definitely, power is used for two purposes which are heating and lighting. Lighting can be supplemented for example with natural light during the day time and at night most farmers tend to implement what is known as the sleeping procedure for chickens. But for heating itself, the only thing that farmers can do is resort to the use of alternative sources of which is either charcoal, the briquettes or the coal but these are very expensive sources of energy and because they are very expensive definitely the cost of production tends to go high depending on which level in the supply chain.”
“You can be the hatchery, the processor, feed miller, farmer, you can be any amongst the supply chain, and electricity tends to have an effect on your planning and also on your supply because there are some of the ventures that might not be able to take up your products because they have no capacity to keep especially if we look at the consumer perspective,” said Chanda.
