Agriculture Business Week

Most often many state colleges and universities don’t receive enough funds from the government to meet their various needs in running their institutions. That is why they are forced to undertake what they call Income-Generating Projects.

Just like the Central Luzon State University in Nueva Ecija. The university has wide land that it can use for various agricultural projects to generate income for its own use. Just like raising tilapia, growing rice and corn, breeding of goats and other animals for sale to the public, planting vegetables and other high-value crops, raising poultry and others.

Among its different projects, broiler contract growing is the school’s big money-maker. CLSU is one of the many contract growers of San Miguel Corporation in Central Luzon starting in 1995. Dr. Edgar Orden, the broiler farm’s project manager, said that they started with 12,000 chicks per batch. Today, it has increased to 24,000 birds. Next year, the production could double to 48,000 because two new tunnel-vent houses with a capacity of 12,000 birds each will be constructed soon.

Dr. Orden says that there is big money in broiler contract growing for as long as the project is properly managed. In a recent batch they harvested, San Miguel Corporation paid them P409,000 for taking care of the birds for 33 days. That means that CLSU received P17 per bird. If the cost incurred by the project in raising them is deducted, the net profit is about R14 per head, according to Dr. Orden.

Dr. Orden explained that in contract growing, the integrator (San Miguel) provides the chicks and the feeds. The contract grower, on the other hand, provides the housing, labor, electricity, water and the medicines, vitamins and minerals. The contract grower is paid for its services depending on how efficient the grower is. If the birds attain a weight beyond the minimum set by the integrator, the grower is paid a high price. On the other hand, if the bird has attained only the minimum weight set, the payment is much less. It is also possible that the grower will pay a penalty if the birds attained a weight below the minimum. Dr. Orden hastened to add, however, that they have never been penalized.

Most of the time, the CLSU broiler project has been among the top ten performers for San Miguel. In fact, in December 2008, Dr. Orden got the award for being the Broiler Grower of the Year of San Miguel Corporation.

In that particular batch where Dr. Orden got the award, the project had a recovery of 94.63 percent. The birds weighed an average of 1.79 kilos each after taking care of them for 33 days. Each bird consumed an average of 1.75 kilos of feed to produce one kilo of meat. The lesser the feeds consumed per kilo of meat produced, the higher the fee that San Miguel pays the contract grower.

That is why Dr. Orden says that special daily attention should be given to the birds from Day One to harvest time. For a start, he said that it is important that the chicks provided by San Miguel are 40 to 45 grams each, active, healthy and without physical defects. If there are chicks that don’t meet the criteria, they have to be changed by the integrator.

Dr. Orden stresses the importance of proper brooding. The right temperature and space for the young birds should be provided. Every week they weigh a random sampling of the birds to monitor their performance. Of course, the quality of the feeds provided is also very critical. A balanced diet will make the birds grow properly. That of course depends on the quality of the feeds supplied by San Miguel.

Dr. Orden explained that the birds also need enough vitamins, amino acid and minerals from the seventh day up to the time they are harvested. These come in various brands. Some are very expensive, especially the imported ones. Fortunately, there are also locally developed formulations that are effective yet very much cheaper.

One of them is Biolyte developed by Dr. Ronaldo Sumaoang, a microbiologist who studied in Germany and who put up his own company, Novatech Agri-Food Industries, several years ago. Biolyte is a liquid that is added to the drinking water of the birds. It contains vitamins, minerals, enzymes and beneficial microorganisms that enhance the birds’ immune system. That way the birds can better withstand stresses like very hot weather, typhoons and the like. The birds grow faster so they can be harvested within a shorter period.

Dr. Orden says that they have been using Biolyte for the last two years. Before he came to know of Biolyte, he was using imported brands that cost him P31,000 for the vitamins and minerals given to 24,000 birds. With Biolyte, the project now spends only P16,000 to P18,000 for the same number of chickens. He said that now many other broiler raisers in Nueva Ecija are also using Biolyte.

He added that most contract growers in Central Luzon produce six batches a year. In their case at CLSU, they produce eight batches a year. Because of this, the university really makes a lot of income. They have only eleven days to clean and disinfect the houses between loadings of the chicks.

Besides being a good money-making venture for the university, the broiler project is also a research project and a training ground for students taking up animal science. It is really one project that CLSU is proud of.

Aside from serving as manager of the broiler project, Dr. Orden is the deputy director of the Small Ruminants Center. This is the department that is involved in research and extension regarding goats and sheep. He finished his course in animal science at CLSU then his masters, also in animal science, at UP Los Baños. He got his doctorate in animal science at the Tottori University in Japan.

By Zac B. Sarian