Chickens in Zambia

[landonjacob]

Hello all!

I'm writing from Lusaka, Zambia where I am doing some work for 3 weeks at a center that educates women and teaches them to sue. One of the projects I'm working on is a building a chicken coop and teaching the caretaker the basics of raising chickens, which I am very excited about.

So I thought I'd post what I was doing and open the floor for any advice, particularly if anyone has had any experience in raising chickens in an African context.

I'm very confident is raising chickens in the states, but curious if there are any added cautions in raising chickens in Zambia that anyone might know about?

Thanks in advance! Also, I do not have access to the internet often. So forgive me if my replies are delayed.

Below are the pictures of the room the chickens will be living. I know some will be worried about the heat, but that won't be an issue.

-Landon

 

[Ridgerunner]

I worked in Angola and Nigeria a few years but had nothing to do with chickens. The basics for chickens should be the same, food, water, predator protection, and some protection against weather.

Not so much in Angola, but in Nigeria a risk would be that someone would either steal the chickens or the owners might eat them instead of keeping them for eggs. We would try to supply electricity and water to some of the villages. One big risk was that either neighboring villages (different tribes) would raid the village for materials or just out of jealousy. Another real common problem was that the people of the village we were trying to help would steal the copper wire for electricity, sell it for scrap, and blame a neighboring tribe. Sometimes it is hard to help people.

Will the tribal elders allow you to help these women? We'd have to bribe the Nigerian chiefs before they would allow us to help their people. An example in the Nigerian delta. The company outfitted a river boat as a clinic, medical and dental, with the intention of sending it to different villages along the river. The chiefs of those villages threatened to sink the boat if it showed up without them getting their bribes. We hired the Nigerian Navy (the army was not worth much but the navy was dependable and very ruthless so they were respected) to provide security for that boat. We felt better doing that than paying bribes.

Where is the feed supply coming from? That may be why they eat the chickens instead of raising eggs. Feed may be hard to find and may be expensive. In Kazahkstan we bought computers for a local school and installed them ourselves. We did not give anyone local money to do that for us. We did not trust them. But we did not just supply the computers and software, we paid for two years worth of electricity so they could use the computers. Money for consumables may be hard to find. This money came from our employees, not the company. The company did similar things on a much larger scale.

Another example from Kazahkstan, again paid for by the employees. We hired a local contractor to upgrade the bathroom at a local orphanage. The contractor wanted payment up front but no way. Then he told us the job was done so he wanted his money. We sent a couple of people to inspect it. All they had done was rip the old fixtures out. They did not get any money until the new fixtures showed up and that was just to pay for them. They got nothing for labor until the job was done and it passed a functional test. I know this was Asia and not Africa but I'd expect the same stuff to apply. Don't be too trusting.

Yes we were one of those evil multinational corporations over there raping the continent and taking advantage of the people.

 

[landonjacob]

Thanks for the info Ridgerunner!

Thankfully, my situation seems to be a lot different than the one you subscribed. I also spent sometime in Nigeria and, no offense to any Nigerians, most of the Zambians I've met have been much more trusting and friendly than my interactions in Nigeria.
We are outside the capital of Zambia, so we don't have to worry about chiefs and elders. We are working in what they call a "compound", which is basically a small city/ community inside of a city. We are working with an organization that is based in the compound and has established great relationships with all the residents, we are good to go on those fronts.

From what I've learned my biggest enemy will be the cats. We are putting chicken wire up over anywhere a cat could get in.

Since we're close to the city, chicken feed is readily available, surprisingly.

Thanks again! Any other input is welcome.

 

[centrarchid]

I have remote interactions experience with a group in Kenya. Like your situation, they had a very heavy coop was setup but they still had concerns about diurnal predators like mongoos and lack of affordable feeds. My biggest concern that was never properly addressed involved forage quality and quantity. There was a lack of even consistent supplementation in even in the form of scratch grains making so the number of birds their large coops could support far exceeded what the landscape could support. Carrying capacity should be a concept heavily invested in. Folks I worked with also kept a local landrace chicken and some of the elders with real working knowledge were not consulted by parties I was working with. Tap into elders, especially the cranky old ladies as they can be goldmines for info concerning good forage plants and the like.

Additionally, the way I keep some of my birds currently are very much in line with what you are likely to run into there.