President of the Greater Accra Poultry Farmers Association (GAPFA), Michael Ampim-Darko has allayed fears of Ghanaians after the government placed a ban on the importation of poultry products.
According to him, Ghanaians should not fear the shortage of poultry products ahead of and during the Christmas festivities this year.
He noted that there is a lot of frozen and homegrown chicken in the country for Ghanaians to enjoy this Christmas.
“There is a lot of frozen chicken in the country for Christmas. A lot of people had already imported their frozen chicken before the ban was put in place. People who also nursed their poultry for Christmas have them fully grown now”, he added.
Speaking in an interview with Samuel Eshun, host of the Happy Morning Show aired on Happy 98.9 FM and e.TV Ghana, Michael advised local poultry farmers to take advantage of the ban.
“It is an opportunity for local farmers to increase their capacity with this ban”.
On his authority, the ban will not cause any feed scarcity either as most of them are produced locally.
“We have a company that imports feed and they might be affected a bit. But generally speaking, most of our poultry feed is produced locally and we have enough”.
The Ministry of Food and Agriculture has banned the importation of poultry products from the Netherlands, Germany, Russia, Denmark and the United Kingdom.
This follows the outbreak of a Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza subtype H5N8 in these countries.
The ban is being implemented with immediate effect.
Some products to be affected by the ban include day-old chicks, hatching eggs, frozen chicken, poultry products and poultry feed.
By: Joel Sanco