President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, on Saturday, 2nd October 2021, visited the premises of Darko Farms, the oldest non-public and largest poultry farm in Ghana, whose operations have been revamped by Authorities’s 1-District-1-Manufacturing facility initiative.
Having been a family title for many Ghanaians, having dominated most supermarkets and distribution shops for recent rooster notably in Kumasi and Accra, Darko Farms went via a interval of decline, on account of main challenges that confronted the home poultry trade within the late Nineteen Nineties together with excessive value of feed, inefficiencies throughout the worth chain, excessive electrical energy and operational value, in addition to competitors from low-cost imported poultry merchandise.
As a part of Authorities’s Industrial Transformation Agenda, being applied by the Ministry of Commerce and Trade, Darko Farms Firm was recognized as one of many distressed however doubtlessly viable firms.
Because of this, the corporate, in 2017, utilized to be a part of the flagship 1-District-1-Manufacturing facility initiative, and. after a complete overview by the Technical Help Group of the Ministry, an quantity of GH¢22.1 million was granted as a mortgage facility to the corporate by Ghana EXIM Financial institution.
The quantity was earmarked to revamp the corporate’s operations, by upgrading the plant and gear, retooling the hatchery, feed mill and processing facility and as working capital help. The corporate has additionally utilized a part of this facility to determine an out-grower scheme, the place quite a few poultry farmers are supported with broiler chicks, feed in addition to technical help to breed their birds.
Darko Farms at the moment has a processing plant working at 10,000 birds per day with one shift, and 20,000 birds per day with two shifts. It has a hatchery with capability to provide 6-million-day-old chicks a yr, breeder farms with a chicken inhabitants of about 30,000 per batch, a layer farm with capability of 100,000 per batch, and business broiler farms with capability of 350,000 birds per cycle of 8 weeks.
As well as, the corporate has a feed mill with an put in capability of 96 metric tons of feed per day, and a storage chilly room of 500 metric tons.
To date, the corporate has created direct employment alternatives for some 250 employees, and not directly for over 500 folks, together with out-growers, distributors, and transporters. At full operational capability, the corporate will instantly make use of greater than 400 employees, with 700 being oblique employment.
Darko Farms is at the moment engaged in negotiations with the Mohinani Group to grow to be the foremost native provider of processed rooster for Kentucky Fried Hen (KFC) restaurant chain. KFC via its native provider has indicated its preparedness to off-take 100,000 birds month-to-month from Darko Farms underneath YUM licensed situations.
Supply: 3news.com|Ghana
