5 Profitable agribusiness ideas in Liberia’s poultry industry

Although poultry farming is generally perceived as rearing chickens for meat and egg purposes, the poultry industry is something far beyond this perception.

The poultry industry in Liberia holds specialized business opportunities that can enhance the sector growth, create employment opportunities, and increase incomes. In this article, we tried to list five (5) specialized business opportunities in Liberia’s poultry industry.

1.Poultry Hatchery

Poultry hatchery is simply a facility where eggs are artificially incubated and hatched. Often, hatcheries supply day-old chicks to individuals or firms that specialize in layer or broiler production.

Establishing a hatchery requires:
• Training/research on hatchery management and maintenance
• Sourcing equipment from a reputable manufacturer
• Finance
• Business license

2. Poultry Feed Production

Feed is one of the most needed poultry farming products in Liberia. Unlike Nigeria’s former president Olusegun Obasanjo’s farm which imports most of its feed materials, small-scale poultry farmers improvise commercial feed due to limited but high price feed in the country.
Whether you want to manufacture feed or retail feed, you must consider the feed type to produce or sell. Some of the common feeds in poultry production include starter feed, grower feed, layer feed, and broiler feed.

However, creating a feed business requires:
• Choosing a feed niche
• Choosing a reputable feed supplier –if you want to retail
• Sourcing equipment for feed manufacturing
• Understanding government laws about feed manufacturing

3. Manufacturing/ Retailing Poultry Equipment

Two ways to start this type of poultry business. First, you can start by fixing adapted or customized products. This puts your creativity to work. Another way to kick start this type of business is to buy equipment from manufacturers and resell them. Some common poultry equipment includes incubator, drinker, feeder, and layer cage, etc.

4. Packaging and Marketing Poultry Meat

Exposed meat poses serious health hazard but that can be reduced by neatly packaging and marketing poultry products which arguably dominate Liberia’s meat market. While improving shelf-life could be a dominating thought of an entrepreneur who wants to venture this type of poultry business, quality, appearance, texture, and flavor are factors to consider from a consumer standpoint.

5. Poultry Marketing and Consulting Services

There is little known about poultry marketing and consulting services but what is obvious is that the industry is evolving and there is an existing need for marketing and consulting services. Starting a poultry marketing and consultancy business would be a plus to the industry which holds hundreds of small-scale poultry farmers that are hungry for growth.