Assessment of Pig Production and Constraints in Mecha District, Amhara Region, Northwestern Ethiopia

Abstract

The study was undertaken in Mecha District, Amhara National Regional State, Northwestern Ethiopia, in 2012/2013. The objectives of the study were to assess production purpose and management practices of pig and to identify constraints and generate baseline information for further research and development. From the district, 6 Kebeles (name of local administration in Ethiopia) were identified and from each Kebele 15 households were selected making the number of respondents 90. A pretested semistructured questionnaire was employed for collecting data through interview and face to face discussion with the pig owners including key informant group discussion and secondary sources. Multivisits to study sites were also made to observe the feeding, housing, and other pig management practices. The results indicated that the purpose of pig production is mainly targeted for additional income and profit for the household in which pigs are sold for external markets as pork is not consumed by local community. Results indicate that pig keepers were farmers or nonfarmers with small land holding and people engaged in other types of work. The major feed source for pig was grazing, followed by crop residue feeding and supplementing with household and agricultural by-products. Pigs are kept in house at least for the night, though the pig house was not separated by age or physiological stage. The most important constraints of pig production in the study area were feed shortage, poor access to veterinary services, and poor market linkage.

Smallholder farmers livestock production and marketing in Bahir Dar Zuria District, Northwestern Ethiopia

“…The overall result of educational characteristics was higher than educational characteristics reported by different authors in Ethiopia (Sisay, 2006;Bedasa, 2012) and percentage of illiterate family members (31.5%) reported in Burie Zuria district, Ethiopia (Adebabay, 2009 majority of household heads (39%) were illiterate followed by read and write (25.5%) and comparable proportion of respondents were high school completed (25%). The report of illiterate class in the current finding was higher than recent reports in northwestern Ethiopia (Mekuriaw and Asmare, 2014;Asmare et al, 2016 (Mulugeta, 2005). The mean family size of respondents is comparable to earlier reports in northwestern Ethiopia (Mekuriaw et al, 2011;Gebretsadik and Negash, 2016) and comparable to the result of Assefa et al (2014) for other regions of Ethiopia which was 6-7 per household.…”

“…The overall land holding of the study area is lower than 0.98 ha for Debermarkos district (Yayeh et al, 2014). The total land holding of the study area was comparable to the reports of Mekuriaw and Asmare (2014) for Mecha district, northwestern Ethiopia. Generally, the land holding of respondents in the current result is lower than the national average land holding size of 1.6 ha reported by Food and Agriculture Organization - FAO (2008).…”

Pork Supply, Marketing and Challenges in Ethiopia

“…This indicates, most of the retailers were small scale meat suppliers. In North western Ethiopia, pigs are sold for external markets as pork is not consumed by local community (Mekuriaw & Asmare, 2014). In western areas of Kenya pork is sold in local shops either as raw pork or as cooked pork where most of butchers (59%) sold raw pork but 41% of them sold cooked pork (Levy et al, 2014).…”

“…There is limited information describing Ethiopian pork marketing and constraints in the value chain. The so far studies conducted in swine sector in Ethiopia focused mainly on characterization of swine production and mainly health aspects (Tekle et al, 2013;Tomass et al, 2013;Kumsa and Kifle, 2014;Mekuriaw and Asmare, 2014;Gebremedhin et al, 2015).…”

Possibilities of establishing a smallholder pig identification and traceability system in Kenya

“…This, as observed by Delgado (2003), is an opportunity for farmers, particularly those in developing countries, to improve their incomes and better their livelihoods. Pigs can contribute in meeting this rising demand (Mekuriaw and Asmare 2014). They do not require much land, are easy to keep, can utilize by-products and food waste and are known to reproduce multiple times in a year.…”