Problems and Prospects of Poultry

Industry in Bangladesh: A Study on

Some Selected Areas
By

Mohammad Shamsuddoha
Assistant Professor, Department of Marketing, University of
Chittagong, Bangladesh

Mir Hossain Sohel

Lecturer, Department of Marketing, University of Chittagong,
Bangladesh

Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1295343

ABSTRACT
Poultry is a substantial contributor to food supply of Bangladesh. Many small and medium
farmers are rearing poultry birds in Bangladesh. Bangladesh is considered as one of the
most appropriate countries in the world for poultry rearing. Development of poultry has
generated considerable employment through the production and the marketing of poultry and
poultry related products. Small improvements in this industry will, in productive and economic
terms, give substantial increases to the benefits of the household may obtain from poultry, measured
as a relative increase of output. In real terms, output may go up to $150 per year a small amount of
money, but in a situation where total income do not exceed $476 a year, such possibilities for
improvement of livelihood deserve to be pursued. The revolution in poultry industry has achieved

more than 200 percent growth last 5 years though they are facing scarcity of efficient or
skilled workforce, mainly because of new technology, using locally available feed
ingredients, breeding, hatching and other inputs. Having such potentiality for a long time,
Bangladesh could not be able to prepare her human resources for this industry. If
Bangladesh will be able to do so, the human resources can contribute much more than what
they are performing now. It will generate much more protein in our domestic needs. This
paper aims to show the picture of the growth of poultry industry, status of existing labor or
workforces and some recommendations regarding its policy matter.
Keywords: Poultry, Human Resources, Bangladesh

Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1295343

1. INTRODUCTION
Land and life are closely entwined in Bangladesh. Over 80% of the Country's people live in
the rural sector and are highly dependent on an agricultural system that is finely attuned to a
tropical monsoon climate. The Human Development Reports 2005 of UNDP indicates that
the total population in Bangladesh is 14.18 crore at an annual growth rate of 1.7 percent. The
per capita income is only US$ 476 (BBS 2006) and the percentage of literacy is around 51.6
per cent (BBS 2006, BANBEIS). 50 percent of the households are functionally landless (22
percent of the households owning no land other than their homesteads and 28 percent owning
only up to 0.50 acre) while 6 percent of the land owning households are controlling more
than 40 percent of the total land (Hossain 1997). About 47.5 percent people live below the
poverty line and they receive less than 1900 calorie per person per day as against the standard
of 2300 calories (HDI, UNDP 1996). In 1998-99, total meat production in Bangladesh was
656,000 tonnes, of which chicken and duck meat contributed 154,000 tonnes, which ra nked
second after beef. Per capita meat consumption was only 5.12 kg per year (Statistical
yearbook of Bangladesh 2000), and per capita protein intake 63gm per day (Statistical
Bulletin Bangladesh 2003) which is markedly below recommended requirements. As protein
intake is recommended to be in the range of 0.8 to 1.6 gm/day per kg body weight for humans
(Anonymous 1998), this requires 56 to 112g protein per day for a person of 70 kg body
weight. Thus there is a need to increase the animal protein production to fulfil the demand of
the people and subsequently to make them sound and healthy for increasing their working
ability. Meat production could be increased through chicken rearing, and chicken meat is the
most popular meat throughout the country. In urban or rural areas, any gr eat festival of either
religion or social origin is unimaginable without roasted chicken. People think that it is a
great dishonour not to serve roast chicken at a festival.

In a condition, where majority of the people are landless, under privileged, malnourished,
uneducated and poor, poultry rearing play a very important role for income generation,
poverty eradication, women empowerment, nutrition, food security and country's economical
and developmental procedure.
Livestock rearing rarely forms a separate land-use enterprise in Bangladesh. Nearly all
animals are kept on farms, closely integrated into agricultural production systems. There are
over 116.5 million chickens. However, with increasing population and decreasing land
holdings, the number of poultry is increasing at an annual rate of 5.9% (Reneta Statistical Year
Book, 2005) . At present most of the poultry birds are reared under scavenging conditions.

Despite rapid development of intensive poultry production in the private sector, per capita
availability of poultry meat (2.87 kg/annum; BBS 1989) and egg (21 eggs/annum; Huque &
Stem, 1993) is still very low. This is largely due to lower productivity of the indigenous
birds reared under scavenging conditions. This led researchers to put their efforts on
identifying the problems faced by the poultry farmers and recommending some suggestions
to overcome them. The theme has been explored through three major questions: What is the
present status of poultry production in Bangladesh? What are the problems faced by the
poultry farmers in the country? What are the ways to overcome those problems?
Poultry in Bangladesh plays a pivotal role in the economy of the country that directly
involves about 85% of peoples who live in the rural area. Bangladesh has a long historical
record of poultry rearing under traditional backyard farming. In 1935 improved variety of
birds were first imported from foreign countries by the Government. In 1947, six poultry
farms were setup in different locations in the country for supplying hatching eggs and chicks
(Reneta Statistical Year Book, 2005). After that, improved variety breed like White Leghorn,
RIR, etc. from the western country like USA were imported by the Bangladesh government
for multiplication and distribution to rural poultry raiser. The commercial poultry raising

started in the country in a smaller scale, which brought economic return to the distressed
women and unemployed youth along with some interested semi-urban and urban poultry
raisers to meet the growing demand of eggs and meat. In 1964, a commercial poultry farm,
Eggs and Hens Ltd., was established by the Late Mr. Ekramul Hossain, which could be
recognized as a mother poultry industry in the private poultry sector. After the liberation of
Bangladesh, BIMAN Bangladesh Airlines, started a commercial poultry farm in the name of
Biman Poultry Complex at Savar, Dhaka with a contractual agreement with Poultry Breeding
Farm of Canada for catering their own flying services and as well as transferring the
commercial poultry farming technology to the farmers. The NGOs, espec ially BRAC, has
developed rural poultry model for the poor farmers that actually stimulated poultry rearing
activities in rural areas in 1983. In early nineties, a number of private parent stock farms
started their operation to produce commercial day old broiler and layer chicks (Reneta
Statistical Year Book, 2005). All the literature shows that poultry is such an item, which can
contribute massively to our countrys GDP if this industry can be able to make skilled human
resources. Nevertheless, lack of adequate infrastructure is the main scarce of this sector.

2. RATIONALE OF THE STUDY

The Government is facing a huge imbalance between import and export trade. That is why
government is searching few sectors that will be able to generate more revenue or save some
foreign currency for the sake of the smooth mobility of the country. Poultry is one of the
important sectors for Bangladesh, which can manage more earnings if this industry is
properly organized. Poultry sector is facing many problems like scarcity of skilled human
resources, lack of technological expertise; inadequate poultry rearing management etc. That
is why, Bangladesh is trying to develop its unskilled human resources into semi skilled or
skilled so that they can contribute to this industry and compete in the local and the global

market. This paper tries to unearth the real situation of the poultry sector in Bangladesh and
at the end; the researchers set some recommendations to overcome the problems faced by this
industry.

3. OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

In the light of the development of the poultry sector in Bangladesh particularly, the objectives
of the study are
@ To explore the present status of the poultry sector in Bangladesh
@ To unearth the problems faced by this industry, and
@ To suggest some recommendations for the development of the poultry sector in
Bangladesh

4. SCOPE AND METHODOLOGIES OF THE STUDY

This paper presents some results of field survey that was conducted in 2007. Data and
information relating to this study were collected from both the primary and the secondary
sources. Primary data relates to different commercial poultry farms that are established in the
selected sample areas. The study covered three regions of Bangladesh i.e. Chittagong,
Comilla and Feni on the basis of purposive sampling method. The total sample respondents
were 60 including 10 commercial poultry farmer s and 50 poultry workers. The nonprobability sampling technique was used to select the sample farmers and workers. The
researchers selected six villages - Sonapur & Champaknagar of Feni, Madaiya & Gazipur of
Comilla and Gahira & Kadurkhil of Chittagong to cover 10 farms and within these 10 farms,
researchers took 50 workers as a sample. Personal interviews and field investigation
techniques were adopted in collecting the primary data and information from the sample
areas. A structured questionnaire was used for collecting the primary data. The secondary

data were collected from different published documents such as Survey reports, Five Year
Plans, and Statistical Yearbooks. Further, various publications of national and international
organizations like NGO Forums, CODEC, DFID, NRI etc were collected. In the process of
analysis of collected data various statistical tools like weighted averages, percentages, tables,
graphs and diagrams were applied in order to make the study worthy, informative, and useful
for the purposes.

5. ANALYSIS OF FINDINGS
5.1 Poultry Production Systems
As per rigorous discussion in the XX world poultry congress at Savar organized by FAO, the
paper presenter has discussed the poultry production system of Bangladesh in the following
ways1. Crossbred rural scavenging production: White Leghorn (WL), Rhode Island Red
(RIR), Fayoumi are available in public sector poultry farms. These are mainly being used
for improvement of local chickens through a crossbreeding program through chick, egg
and pullet distribution, and cockerel exchange activities. At present, this program has got
less priority in Bangladesh.
2. Smallholder resident scavenge chicken consisting of several birds: Native chickens
are extensively raised in the backyard with night shelter and little supplementary feeding
by rural people specially women and children; the males are normally raised for meat and
breeding purposes, while the hens are raised for egg production and reproduction. An
estimate showed that about 75 per cent of the eggs and 86 per cent of the meat is
produced by this system. These birds are raised with little or no inputs and productivity is
very low and irregular with an ave rage annual egg production 3545 eggs weighing 33
38 gm (Huque et al. 1990).

3. Small commercial rural farming with pure line improved breeds: This system of
production is one of the main activities of public sector with collaborative program of
Non-Government Organization (NGO) managed completely by the women. At the
beginning, this type of birds was used for the semi-scavenging model developed with
seven components for rural poultry development. Many small farmers transferred their
farming from pure line stock to hybrid stock after having their improved skill.
4. Small commercial farming with imported hybrids chicks: The small farming
commercial producers receive day-old chicks from local hatcheries or imported ones. A
large number of youth and women have become small-scale poultry farmers in the
vicinity of big cities. The youths receive training from Department of Livestock Services,
Youth Training Centres and NGOs. This production system is expanding in the country
with the improvement of skills of the small farmers.
5. Large commercial poultry based on hybrids day-old chicks: These commercial layer
and broiler enterprises are expanding in the vicinity of the cities for catering egg and meat
to the cities. Numbers of this type of industrial ventures are very few which produce only
4 per cent eggs and 2 per cent meat of total production of Bangladesh (Huque and Stem,
1993).
Table 1. Chicken production systems
No. of birds

Investment on 40days (Tk in app

fig)

10 to 300

1,000-30,000

Small commercial farming

500 to 5000

45,000 450,000

Large commercial poultry

agribusiness

More than
5000
Source: Field Survey

4,25000+

Systems
Small commercial rural Farming

5.2 Poultry Sector in Bangladesh

Table 2: Growth of Commercial Poultry
Particulars
1991 2000 2001
Layer
Parent Stock
22.5 145
236
Day old chick per year
2025 1305 2124
0
0
Day old chick per week 38.9 250
408
Price of DOC*
16 27.78 23.26
Broiler
Parent Stock
30
750 1062
Day old chick per year
3540 9000 1003
Day old chick per week
68
1730 1929
Price of DOC*
24.6 19.32
Source: Poultry Business Directory 2007

in Bangladesh (figure in thousand)

Year
2002 2003 2004 2005
2006
370
138
3330 1242
0
0
640
239
15.15 27.33

344
3096
0
595
28.21

212
1908
0
367
25.67

282
25380
488
35.20

1381 1952
1160 1639
2230 3153
21.09 17.09

2358
1641
3156
13.2

2292
1925
3702
24.46

2745
288225
5542
25.61

Note: Calculation is made based on parents stock (Imported & locally produced Parent
Stock DOC).*DOC mean Day old Chicks

Layer Vs Broiler Parent Stock (in '000)

3000
2000
1000
0
Layer Parent Stock
91

2000

2001

Broiler Parent Stock

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

Fig 1: Layer and Broiler Parent Stock

From the above table it is eminent that the commercial poultry sector in Bangladesh is
growing year after year. The parent stock of Layer is increasing at an average rate of 133%
every year but some deviation is seen at 2003 and 2005 whereas in 2001, 2002, 2004 and
2006 the growth rate is 163%, 157%, 249% and 133% respectively. On the contrary, a
consistent growth rate of 125% is seen in case of broiler parent stock.

Layer Vs Broiler day Old Chick Per Year

('000)
400000
200000
0
Layer Day old chick per year
91

2000

2001

2002

Broiler Day old chick per year

2003

2004

2005

2006

Fig 2: Layer Vs Broiler day Old Chick Per Year

The average growth rate in case of Layer day old chick per week is 133% except deviation in
the year of 2003 and 2005. Nevertheless, in case of broiler day old chick per week the growth
rate is consistently 125% on an average but no deviation is seen. It is also eminent that the
demand for broiler chicken is consistently increasing every year.
Price of Layer Vs Broiler Day Old Chicks
40
30
20
10
0
Layer Price of DOC
91

2000

2001

Broiler Price of DOC

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

Fig 3: Price of Layer Vs Broiler Day Old Chicks

Moreover the variation in prices every year in case of layer da y old chicks is very much
inconsistent whereas for broiler day old chicks it seems to be consistent enough for the last
two years.
5.3 Development of poultry Industry in Bangladesh
Poultry sector hopes to raise its annual turnover to Tk 10,000 crore from Tk 4,000 crore
through adoption of improved technology and increasing local consumption. During the XX
World Poultry Congress at Savar organized by FAO, leaders and experts of the sector have

10

sought more policy and fiscal supports from the government to give a further boost to the
sector. The supports sought in the forms of policy guidelines for poultry sector, 30 percent
cash incentive like that given to agro products, extension of tax exemption up to 2015 and
massive campaigns for raising domestic consumption. Sources linked to the World Poultry
Science Association-Bangladesh Branch said the annual value of per capita consumption of
broiler meat and eggs is $622 million in Bangladesh while the per capita meat consumption is
1.9 kilogram. However, the per capita meat consumption in Pakistan is 3.9 kg, Indonesia 3.8
kg, the Philippines 6.8 kg, China 5.4 kg, Thailand 14 kg, Malaysia 33.3 kg, Hong Kong 57.5
kg and Japan 13.8 kg. Experts attributed the low protein consumption in Bangladesh to
general misconception among people about broiler chicken. Negative campaign against
poultry birds cost the industry an estimated Tk500 crore in first six months of 2004 and led to
closure of 1000 to 1500 farms, industry people claimed leaders of the poultry association said
now about 40 to 50 lacs people are involved with this sector which has an investment of Tk
6,000-7,000 crore. The sector must achieve international standard through adoption of new
technology, which will reduce cost of production and ensure quality of meat and eggs. The
farmers, especially the smaller ones, need to be acquainted with the latest technology through
exhibitions and seminars, they felt. They observed that there has been remarkable use of
modern technology in the breeding sector that adopted environment controlled housing,
automated feeding and drinking systems, computer controlled incubators and sophisticated
diagnostics. About 100 per cent of grand parent stock and 60 per cent of parent stock are now
being raised locally in environment-controlled housing, the association estimates. The
international poultry show, forth of its kind in Dhaka, saw participants from 38 countries
exhibiting poultry techs, accessories and logistics in 114 stalls. The theme of the 4th
international Poultry Show and Seminar 2005 is Poultry Industry in Bangladesh: Challenges
and Opportunities where 36 papers had been selected from different authors from Australia,

11

Bangladesh, Canada, Denmark, Ethiopia, India, Iran, New Zealand, Nigeria and Austria.
President of WPSA told New Age that Bangladesh needs to ensure quality of meat, feed and
eggs if she wants to explore export opportunities. We are exporting 150 tonnes of poultry
feed monthly to Assam of India for the last two months and looking to ship 2-3 lakh hatching
eggs a week to Europe and Middle East shortly. If quality can be ensured, the country has
the potential to start exporting meat within next six to seven months.
5.4 Role of Government
Some of the challenges in sustainable poultry development and management pertain to
deciding the most appropriate institutional framework. One is the delineation of the
respective roles of government and the private sector. Raising the level of capacity and
responsiveness of government poultry management agencies carrying out the ir role and
functions to implement sub-sectoral strategies. One of the important roles of government is
developing, with the private sector, a conducive and enabling policy environment for
sustainable poultry development and management. The role of government in poultry
development includes intervention in areas where the private sector participation is not
appropriate or feasible. In certain circumstances, this may be the case with respect to the
provision of physical infrastructure in strategic locations to support the integration of the
poultry sector with other sectors of the economy. Where possible, such infrastructure should
be financed by the private sector. In cases where government does provide essential
infrastructure, this does not imply management of the facilities by government itself; the
private sector may have a comparative advantage in this aspect.
5.5 Role of the Private Sector
The private sector will be expected to play a major and increasing role in the poultry sector.
Consistent with the basic principles outlined above and with lessons learned from past
projects in the sector, the Bank will promote the role of the private sector in poultry rearing,

12

feeding, hatching, processing, and marketing. NGOs are supporting for organizing poultry
communities, enhancing their awareness of resource management approaches, developing
community self-reliance, and coordinating ecosystem-wide resource management plans and
systems.

6. PROBLEMS OF POULTRY MARKETING IN BANGLADESH

A rank analysis has been conducted based on the problems that influence on the development
of poultry sector of Bangladesh. The factors considered as important during the interview
with respondents are - lack of financial credit, inadequate modern poultry equipment,
inadequate logistic support, lack of adequate poultry rearing knowledge, absence of
government help and guidance etc.
Table3: Problems faced by poultry farmers
No.
Problems
1 Inadequate modern
poultry equipment
2 Absence of adequate
marketing Knowledge
3 Lack of adequate
poultry rearing
knowledge
4 Lack of modern
communication
facilities
5 Lack of financial credit
6 Inadequate
infrastructure and
logistic support
7 Absence of government
help and guidance
8 Lack of Private
investment
9 Problem of getting
Reasonable price
10 Expensive poultry feed
ingredients

1=10 2=9 3=8 4=7 5=6 6=5 7=4 8=3 9=2 10=1 Total %

Ranks

230 36 40 21 12 20 12

384 11.20

140 36 24 28 30 35

322 9.39

150 63 48 21 30 15

10

350 10.20

45 32 28 30 30 20 12

281 8.19

10

70

290 72 16 21

10

427 12.45

160 54 56 56 24 15

380 11.08

140 63 32 35 30 10 12

10

341 9.94

130 81 40 28 18

15

337 9.83

80

36 40 28 36 35 16 12 12

297 8.66

90

45 48 49 30 15 16

311 9.07

Grand Total

3430
[Source: Field Survey]

13

7. PROBABLE SUGGESTIONS TO OVERCOME

These problems can be overcome if some steps are taken by the concerned authority. The
main objectives are to develop huge number of unskilled people into semi skilled or skilled.
There are probable steps suggested by the researchers by the opinion taken from various
poultry farmers and relevant authorities. These are as follows.
I. Government initiatives: To develop human resources to operate poultry sector
effectively to compete locally and globally; government has to take major step like
create institutions for training poultry farmers and businessmen, increasing
infrastructure and financing. Government has to motivate the businessmen and their
allied to come up for better training and education.
II. To design Proper HRD planning for poultry farmers : Government authority
should take the overall responsibility to make effective human resources through coordination of various agencies. This agency should monitor the co-ordination matter.
Effective HR planning and coordination is equally significant for the private and the
public sector in Bangladesh. Especially educational infrastructure should be updated
based on need. In Bangladesh, there is lack of poultry training institutions, it should
be more than that otherwise unskilled labor will never be able to meet up the future
demand of protein through poultry sector.
III. To arrange easy loan: Every organization like government, private financial
institutions, NGOs, and foreign investors should come up to give micro credit to
poultry sector.
IV. To employ professional trainer: To generate the admirable flow of skilled human
resources in poultry sector, professional trainer is mandatory for all. Professional
trainer should be hire d from domestic or foreign sources to give technical knowledge,
proper education, training, and motivations to the poultry farmers.

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V. To adapt appropriate Modern technology: A low-cost intensive or semi-intensive

poultry technology should be initiate d for the sake of developing skilled human
resource for the poultry industry. These sorts of projects should have technical
capacity and ability of farmers to provide the required inputs exclusively from their
own resources.
VI. To arrange workshop, seminar, and live demonstration for rele vant Poultry
workers : The relevant authority should arrange workshops, seminars, conferences,
and live demonstrations for imparting training to the farmers regarding the latest
knowledge of poultry and marketing.
VII. To develop security situation: The relevant authority should improve the security
situation for smooth supply of day old chicks, live birds movements, poultry
accessories and equipment movements all over the country.

8. CONCLUDING REMARKS
The role of poultry sector for developing human resources is enormous. Country like
Bangladesh has great emergence to develop her human resources into efficient and effective
basis for the domestic market to meet up the demand of protein. It is one of the substitutes in
connection with the development of Bangladesh. Skilled human resources can be able to
contribute to the society in a significant way in various sectors. There is extraordinary
competition in free market economy. Everybody compete with their efficient human resource
and increase their productivity, innovation of new products, ensures quality assurance and
create new market positioning. Moreover, efficient human resources should be created from a
good institution. Consequently, human resource development through good institutions
should be given the top most preference in the poultry development process of Bangladesh.

15

After maintaining all the recommendations, skilled human resources will be built so that they
will be the key factors or contributors to develop the poultry sector and Bangladesh as well.

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