Research methodology

According to many study the increase in the wet litter in the poultry farming is related to the concern of food safety, health of the flock, welfare of the animals and environmental welfare. Litter is described through many conditions starting from the fresh bedding material to the time period of its removal from the meat chicken shed (Ezeh, Anyiro & Chukwu, 2012).  The main problem with the wet litter is the release of odour. Such odour detected in the poultry farming is the complex mixture of various gases that are created due to the uncontrolled decomposition of anaerobic manure and composition of the wet litter. There are 60 to 150 different gaseous combinations from which ammonia creates most strong odour in the poultry farming. Such situation affects the health of the flock and the human society as well. It hampers the welfare of the animals and environment (Bolan et al., 2010). On the other hand it has been found that over the year the poultry industry is contributing a huge portion in the economic growth of the West African countries such as Nigeria. The poultry industry contributes 25% of the total GDP of the country (De Janvry & Sadoulet, 2010). However, there are some problems that are associated with the poultry farming. For example, the disease, health factor, nutritional factor, housing factor and environmental factor related to poultry farming (Elson, 2015). Thus it is important to focus on the study related to mitigating wet litter to resolve issues related to poultry farming to improve the poultry industry in order to foster the economic growth in Nigeria.

The purpose of the assignment is to provide a research on poultry farming in Nigeria to understand the wet litter management to facilitate the Agriculture Academia, agriculture industry and rural farming in West Africa. In this regard the paper will provide a brief discussion of methodology of the research and the benefits of the research to the Agriculture Academia, agriculture industry and rural farming in West Africa.

Wet litter in the poultry farming is related to the concern of food safety, health of the flock, welfare of the animals and environmental welfare. The purpose of the study is to provide research on poultry farming in West African country such as Nigeria in order to identify the issues related to wet litter and introduce effective strategies to reduce the odour dispersed by wet litter and improve the wet litter management. In this regards the study has used primary research such as survey within 50 people in Nigeria and secondary research such as past research material or literature related to wet litter management and poultry farming in Nigeria. It has been found that issues of poor litter management is related to health factor, nutrition factor, welfare of animals and environmental factor. Due to lack of knowledge regarding the bedding process, types of food, ventilation and disposal of manure the poultry industry is suffering from issues related to wet litter management. In this regards the study has provided effective information for managing wet litter in an effective manner. It has been found that the research is beneficial for agricultural academia, agriculture industry and rural farming in Nigeria. The most of the participants of the survey has suggested for further study in this sector in order to improve the poultry industry and foster the economic growth of the country.

Benefits of the research in Agriculture Academia in West Africa

In this research both the primary and secondary research method has been used in order to gather information about the poultry farming in Nigeria. For primary research a survey has been arranged within 50 people of Nigeria. The participants include 10 practical nutritionist, 7 non-professional poultry-men, 13 veterinarians and 20 academic nutritionists. For secondary research the study has used effective data sources such as Google scholar, Cinhal and PubMed in order to collect relevant literature regarding poultry farming in West Africa. Relevant search term has been used to identify proper literature. For example,  wet litter management in Nigeria, problem associated with we litter, odour management in poultry farming, poultry farming, poultry farming in West Africa, poultry farming in Nigeria, importance of poultry farming, literature review of poultry farming in Nigeria, importance of research in poultry farming. Most relevant and current literatures have been chosen in order to carry out the research in an effective manner.

The information and data gathered from the resources has been analysed and utilized to understand the poultry farming in an effective manner. The overall perception of the participants was the issue of wet litter is related to the issue of welfare created by the poultry industry and research would help to identify the contributing factors in the incident and help to introduce effective intervention to manage wet litter in poultry farming in an effective manner. Such information collected from the research would be beneficial for Agriculture Academia in West Africa. It would also facilitate the Agriculture industry and the rural farming in West Africa as well (Tarsoo, 2014).

Agriculture academia is a field that provides knowledge regarding agriculture related products and industry (Pimbert et al., 2010). Introducing research in the poultry farming in order to understand the wet litter management would help to promote the importance of odour management in poultry farming in Nigeria in an effective manner. The research would help to provide effective information related to the wet litter management and odour management in poultry farming, issues in poultry farming, contributing factors and effective interventions for improvement as well. The information gathered by the research would help to identify the research gap and introduce further research in order to bridge the gap effectively (Tarsoo, 2014).

It has been found that poultry farming has become one of the most important ways for income. The research has indicated that the productions of poultry farming like meat and eggs account for nearly about 30% of the total livestock output in Nigeria. Thus, there is a huge opportunity to introduce research in the field of poultry farming to improve the sector and induce economic growth in the country (De Janvry & Sadoulet, 2010). However the research has provided important information related to the issues in the poultry farming in Nigeria. It has been found that the animal welfare group has criticised the poultry farming for the transmission of various disease, hampering the animal welfare and environmental welfare through it (Akidarju, Onyemaechi & Dauda, 2010). The farm condition is very poor and the industry lack workers health and safety. The nutrition factor is also considered in the wet litter management (Collett, 2012). Participants have indicated that increasing concern due to lack of odour management in the poultry farming has increase the scope of study to introduce effective strategies for odour management and ensure the safety of the flock and the workers as well.  Thus, it has become an important topic of research and has facilitated the agriculture academia in an effective manner (Pimbert et al., 2010).

Benefits of the research in Agriculture Industries in West Africa

Such research is beneficial for the agriculture academia in West Africa as it provides adequate information to understand the one of the main agriculture related industry (Pimbert et al., 2010). The information would help to inspire the student of the agriculture field to increase their interest in the research of poultry farming in order to identify serious issues and introduce relevant interventions to cope up with such issues. The research on poultry farming would help to introduce effective safety culture in the poultry industry to reduce the risk of transmission of disease. Through the research the agriculture academia would provide more important information that would help to improve the industry and provide effective procedure and equipment for wet litter management (Musa et al., 2012). Thus it can be said that, it is beneficial to introduce research regarding poultry farming in Nigeria as the industry is contributing effectively in the economic growth of the country and increasing the opportunity of study to improve the agricultural sector of the country in an effective manner. In addition it could help to reduce the rate of health issues of flock and human due to the elimination of gas in the environment from poultry farming by introducing effective management process through the research, thus could increase the value of agriculture academia in West African countries (Pimbert et al., 2010).

Agriculture industry plays an important role in the economic community of West African states. Agricultural industry is defined as the backbone of economy in West Africa. The poultry farming is another important part of agricultural industry. The poultry farming affects the society of Western African country such as Nigeria as most of the national income, jobs and food security is related to this sector (Tijjani et al., 2012).In terms of economy the agricultural industry contributes 35% of the gross domestic products of Nigeria from which the poultry industry contributes 25%. 16.3% services exported from the poultry industry in Nigeria that helps to bring foreign currency in the country which is used to import necessary consumer goods, equipment for farming and some intermediate goods for the industry (De Janvry & Sadoulet, 2010). In terms of employment the poultry farming is considered as the biggest employer in the West African country.  Nearly about 60% population in the West African country is engaged in agriculture industry such as poultry farming (Tijjani et al., 201). Thus, it is important to introduce effective research related to poultry farming to induce the improvement of the sector in order to foster the overall growth of the country like Nigeria.

Benefits of the research in Rural Farming in West Africa

                                                   Figure: Increase in the production of poultry farms.

                                                                Source: (De Janvry & Sadoulet, 2010)

The research has identified some source of odour in the poultry farming, for example, most of the poultry use a little bedding for the flock thus the bedding become overloaded with manure which resulted in release of odour. On the other hand, wet litter from the leaky water has been found to contribute in the formation of odour. Other factors include poor disposal of deal animals, ventilation and manure piles without cover (Musa et al., 2012). Identification of such factors would help the agriculture industry to use proper management system to address the factors. Such information has indicated that using adequate space for bedding, use proper disposal system for dead animals, repairing the leaky water to manage wet litters and use proper ventilation would help to mitigate the contributing factors, thus could help to reduce the formation of odour in the poultry farming (Tarsoo, 2014). Due to wet litter and poor management of odour many diseases are transmitted through poultry farming. It has been found in the survey that most of the participants have suggested to introduce research in order to identify proper antibiotics or vaccines to resolve the issue (Ezekiel et al., 2012). Thus it can be said that the research is beneficial for agriculture industry as it would help the industry to identify risk factors related to wet litter management in poultry farming and introduce effective interventions to address such factors. It would help to reduce the threat of hampering environmental and animal welfare and maintain well-being in Nigeria. Hence, the industry would increase its productivity and profitability in an effective manner (Olagunju & Babatunde, 2011).

                                                   Figure: Some effective prevention plan for litter management.

                                                                         Source: (Ezekiel et al., 2012)

In the rural farming due to lack of adequate knowledge, proper management and equipment most of the rural farms in Nigeria fail to use wet litter management process thus, face major loss for high death rate of flock due to suffering from disease (Muhammad et al., 2010).  It has been found that most of the rural farming lack proper land application for bedding, proper ventilation, proper litter material and nutrition factor (Ja’afar-Furo & Gabdo, 2010). Research has shown that incorporation of manure in soil is beneficial in order to reduce the odour. It has been found in the survey that using natural ventilation could facilitated ventilation process in rural farming as it is cost effective. Research has identified that utilize proper litter material is also important and in rural farming using wood shavings or crushed straw would be beneficial for water absorption as it is less expensive and easily available (Musa et al., 2012).

Proper choice of nutrition plays an important role in wet litter management, especially the choice of proper salt and sodium and potassium content. Foods that are less digestible or indigestible bind to the water molecule in gut and lead to the consequence of wet litter and bacterial infection.  It has been found that footpad dermatitis is one of the most common cases in the rural farming due to wet litter in Nigeria (Akidarju, Onyemaechi & Dauda, 2010). Research has suggested that wheat can be used for the diet of meat chicken in association with soluble nitrogen, sodium and potassium. It would help to maintain good quality of litter. Some antibiotic has been introduced to counter the issue of various disease due to poor litter management, however, the research would help to introduce more effective medicines, vaccines or antibiotics to address such issue. Such information provided by the research would help the rural farming in Nigeria to improve the wet litter management and odour management in order to reduce the loss due to the death of flock (Collett, 2012). In addition research would help to provide information regarding improved technologies as well. In this way the research would be beneficial for the rural farming in West African countries such as Nigeria.

                Figure: Poultry management (Feed type, feeding time, use of vaccine and antibiotics) in the rural poultry farming

                                                              Source: (Akidarju, Onyemaechi & Dauda, 2010)

Thus, it can be said that from the above discussion that research related to the poultry farming in West African country such as Nigeria in order to identify the issues in wet litter management and introduce effective strategies to reduce the odour and wet litter is beneficial for agriculture academia, agriculture industry and rural farming in Nigeria. Survey has indicated that most of the participants want to introduce further study in order to improve the wet litter management and reduce the issues related to welfare of animal and environment.

Reference:

Akidarju, M. S., Onyemaechi, E. G., & Dauda, M. G. (2010). An assessment of some poultry management practices and disease recognition by poultry farmers in Maiduguri arid zone, Nigeria. World’s poultry science journal, 66(2), 285-296.

Akidarju, M. S., Onyemaechi, E. G., & Dauda, M. G. (2010). An assessment of some poultry management practices and disease recognition by poultry farmers in Maiduguri arid zone, Nigeria. World’s poultry science journal, 66(2), 285-296.

Bolan, N. S., Szogi, A. A., Chuasavathi, T., Seshadri, B., Rothrock, M. J., & Panneerselvam, P. (2010). Uses and management of poultry litter. World’s Poultry Science Journal, 66(4), 673-698.

Collett, S. R. (2012). Nutrition and wet litter problems in poultry. Animal feed science and technology, 173(1-2), 65-75.

De Janvry, A., & Sadoulet, E. (2010). Agriculture for development in Africa: business-as-usual or new departures?. Journal of African Economies, 19(suppl_2), ii7-ii39.

Ezeh, C. I., Anyiro, C. O., & Chukwu, J. A. (2012). Technical efficiency in poultry broiler production in Umuahia capital territory of Abia State, Nigeria. Greener Journal of Agricultural Sciences, 2(1), 001-007.

Ezekiel, C. N., Bandyopadhyay, R., Sulyok, M., Warth, B., & Krska, R. (2012). Fungal and bacterial metabolites in commercial poultry feed from Nigeria. Food Additives & Contaminants: Part A, 29(8), 1288-1299.

Ja’afar-Furo, M. R., & Gabdo, B. H. (2010). Identifying major factors of poultry production as sustainable enterprise among farmers using improved methods in rural Nigeria. International Journal of Poultry Science, 9(5), 459-463.

Muhammad, M., Muhammad, L. U., Ambali, A. G., & Mani, A. U. (2010). A survey of early chick mortality on small-scale poultry farms in Jos, central Nigeria. Int J Poult Sci, 9, 446-449.

Musa, W. I., Saidu, L., Kaltungo, B. Y., Abubakar, U. B., & Wakawa, A. M. (2012). Poultry litter selection, management and utilization in Nigeria. Asian Journal of Poultry Science, 6(2), 44-55.

Olagunju, F. I., & Babatunde, R. O. (2011). Impact of Credit on Poultry Productivity in South Western, Nigeria. ARPN J. Agric. Biol. Sci, 6, 58-64.

Pimbert, M. P., Barry, B., Berson, A., & Tran-Thanh, K. (2010). Democratising agricultural research for food sovereignty in West Africa. IIED.

Tersoo, P. (2014). Agribusiness as a veritable tool for rural development in Nigeria. International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences, 3, 26-36.

Tijjani, H., Tijani, B. A., Tijjani, A. N., & Sadiq, M. A. (2012). Economic analysis of poultry egg production in Maiduguri and environs of Borno State, Nigeria. Scholarly Journal of Agricultural Science, 2(12), 319-324.