Poultry-based anti-poverty measures suffer a jolt

The West Bengal government has set a target of culling 2.2 million chickens, ducks and other poultry in the next seven days even as bird flu was confirmed in the district of Malda, sandwiched between the infected districts of south Dinajpur and Nadia in the state.

The culling target represented close to five per cent of the state's annual production of about 40 million fowl and would deliver a major setback to a critical aspect of the state government's anti-poverty programme.

"Combined with the 60 day to 90 day quarantine imposed in all affected areas, this would mean destruction of about a third of the state's poultry output along with loss of income for around 50,000 of lower income group families and self-help groups and a blow to the poultry-based anti-poverty measures of the state", admitted a top functionary of the state'a animal husbandry department.

However, the state government was yet to announce any relief package for affected growers and was only promising the aid doled out by the Centre as compensation.

The committee to tackle the bird flu scare was headed by chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, with health minister Surja Kanto Mishra and animal husbandry minister Anisur Rahman among its members.

Poultry was a major source of income for rural poor specially rural women an individuals or as self help groups (SHGs) focused on poultry rearing.

The state had a three-pronged poultry-based anti-poverty strategy in operation in the affected districts and in at least three more non-affected districts, all of which were stalled now.

"In 2006-07, a special programme for distribution of a million chicks of high yield variety to 100,000 women members of self-help groups was done as the first step in the strategy", said the bureaucrat.

The second plank of the strategy was to assist local entrepreneurs and farmers to set up poultry farms and the third was to assist in the setting up of large sized poultry rearing and processing units in the organized private sector", he added.

While he could not give details of the exact nature of the losses caused, the source said that the outbreak of bird flu would also mean the complete destruction of the poultry stocks in three of the new six state poultry farms set up recently to rear chicks for anti-poverty programmes.

Six poultry and duck farms were set up in Tollygunj, Ranaghat (Nadia), Gobardanga (North 24-Parganas), Domkol (Howrah), Raiganj (Murshidabad) and Malda town (Malda district) in this fiscal under this programme which was financed through 80 per cent financial assistance from the Centre and 20 per cent from the state exchequer. In addition, the state had 22 older poultry farms and the stocks to be destroyed were being identified, the source added.

The West Bengal government had identified the use of poultry-based projects to combat poverty because the state consumed more than double the volume of poultry and eggs it produced.

The government decided to bridge this gap by raising production inside the state while creating income opportuntities for underprivileged families and women-based SHGs.

The state's production of fowl was about 42 million birds in 2005-06 while egg production was around 3 billion in the same fiscal. The state had set ambitious targets for enhancement of poutry and egg production based on recommended per capita consumption.

The target of per capita consumption of poultry-based protein, using accepted nutrition need data, was 30 grams per day per capita, entailing production of 9.5 lakh tons of poultry and meat per annum in the state.

In parallel, the state had set a target of per capita consumption of egg based on accepted nutrition need data at 10 eggs per annum per capita, entailing production of 8.5 billion eggs per annum in the state.

The districts hit by bird flu were Malda, Birbhum, South Dinajpur, Bardhaman, Nadia, Murshidabad and Bankura.

The districts accounted for nearly 45 per cent of the state's poultry and egg production, which was estimated to be worth Rs 1100 crore in 2006-07.

The sector had doubled in size between 2000 and 2004, and was growing at 15 per cent.