Agriculture in Zambia 9:Broiler
growers, whether big or small, have a responsibility to deliver a healthy,
tasty chicken to the customer. But do they? And what about the stock feed manufacturers? Do growers know what they feed their chickens?
Text by Bert Witkamp
Version: 22 February 2015
1) Until
recently I thought that factory stock feed finisher was free of pharmaceuticals
so as to ensure that the human chicken consumer would not be treated with
coccidiostats, antibiotics and possibly hormones. But then I came across the
term “withdrawal finisher” in the Ross and Cobb broiler manuals (freely
downloadable from their websites; thanks!). Withdrawal finisher is finisher
without medication and should be provided to broilers for as long as it takes
to flush out the medication/growth promoters that have been added to factory
stock feed as of day 1. The withdrawal period is 7 to 10 days. Choma Milling does not put
antibiotics in the finisher, most brands do and you have to order from these
major stock feed producers the special “withdrawal finisher” that in fact
should be the normal finisher if you don’t want to administer harmful antibiotics
to the customer that provides you with income. Novatek produces withdrawal feed
as part of their regular package; Nutri Feed is willing to do so on request. I
don’t know the National Milling situation – they don’t have a useful website
with an e-mail link. This account confirms my earlier notion that stock feed
must be labeled and the label must provide a full account of all pharmaceutical
additives. It would appear that the Poultry Association of Zambia (linked to
ZNFU) has some work to do in this regard.
2) When I tried
to find out if it was possible to make a combined withdrawal feed order with
fellow local broiler growers it appeared that most growers don’t use finisher at
all but finish their chickens on grower – the reasoning being its presumed
higher nutritional value for 4-7 week old broilers than the standard finisher. ARE
THESE FARMERS AWARE THAT THEIR BROILERS AT THE TIME OF CONSUMPTION BY HUMANS
ARE CONTAMINATED WITH ANTIBIOTICS? Do they know that this practice of permanent
administration of medication results in the development of new strains of
bacteria that are increasingly harder to combat?
3)
Concerning the sense of replacing finisher by grower because of presumed
nutritional advantages: starter, grower and finisher feed composition is based
on the different nutritional requirements of the broiler in its short, over-speeded, living trajectory. In this trajectory the nutrient focus shifts
gradually from “growth and little energy for body maintenance” to “much energy
for maintenance and little for growth.” For this reason the amount of maize in
feed should increase as the birds grow. If commercial finisher contains 20%
crude protein (CP) as recommended by standard manuals I would say that
replacing finisher by grower on nutritional grounds is senseless, and even counterproductive.
Unfortunately commercial Zambian finisher is likely to contain only 17% crude
protein, but this may not be true for all brands. Grower has a higher % of
crude protein than finisher (Nutri Feed grower for example has 18.5%) and therefore comes
closer to handbook standards for finisher. Farmers should check on their stock feed suppliers so as to make an informed nutrition feed choice. They should, in any
case, provide withdrawal finisher for at least a week before slaughter. Ten days is better.
4) The
matter of pharmaceuticals added to feed is aggravated by the tendency of many
farmers to treat broilers automatically with antibiotics whenever there is
trouble (and trouble there often is – broilers are bred and reared for trouble;
developing meat on the highway while the remainder of the body is at pedestrian
speed); by the unwarranted addition of often unspecified boosters that may contain
more pharmaceuticals on top of those already in the stock feed and by shopkeepers that supply clients as a matter of
routine vitamin packages combined with antibiotics. Your chicken by such careless administration
of a cocktail of medicines now is an experimental laboratory for the development
of new strains of bacteria resistant to conventional medicine. And so are you!
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