ads by google

BREEDING METHODS FOR IMPROVEMENT OF POULTRY

  • Poultry egg and meat are important sources of high quality proteins, minerals and vitamins to balance the human diet. Specially developed breeds of egg type chicken are now available with traits of quick growth and high feed conversion efficiency. Depending on the farm-size, layer (for eggs) farming can be main source of family income or can provide income and gainful employment to farmers throughout the year. Poultry manure has high fertilizer value and can be used for increasing yield of all crops 
Breeding methods for improvement of poultry
  • The term poultry although very often used as synonymous to chicken, includes a number of avian species such as chicken, turkey, geese, guineafowl, peafowl etc., Poultry development in the country has shown steady progress over the years, primarily due to research and development schemes of Government as well as effective marketing & management by organized private sector. 
  • India, with poultry population of 489 million and estimated more than 532 billion eggs production, ranks among the top three countries in egg production in the world. During 1980-81 , egg production reached double-digit billion figures ( 10 billion numbers) and has increased over 5 times currently. Per capita availability has, during this period, also increased nearly 3 times from a mere fifteen numbers per person per annum to forty-two per annum. 
  • The broiler production is growing at the rate of nearly 8-10% every year and growth in production of poultry/chicken meat increased from mere 0.12 million metric tonnes in 1981 to 2.2 million metric tonnes presently. The annual per capita availability of eggs and chicken meat has also increased from a mere 10 eggs and 146 grams in 1970 s to around 42 eggs and 1.6 Kgs respectively presently. 
  • India's share of the world trade in poultry and poultry products is very small. However, the country has come a long way during the last decade increasing its value of exports from nearly Rs. 11 crores in 1993-94 to around Rs. 441 crores during 2007-08. Poultry Sector, besides providing direct or indirect employment to nearly 3 million people is a potent tool for subsidiary income generation for many landless and marginal farmers and also provides nutritional security especially to the rural poor. 
  • To provide necessary services to the farmers of the country region-wise, four regional centres have been restructured on the principle of one-window service to the farmers. In these regional Central Poultry Development Organizations ( CPDOs) located at Chandigarh, Bhubaneswar, Mumbai and Hessarghatta, training is also being imparted to the farmers to upgrade their technical skills. To monitor the production potential of various stocks in the country, the Central Poultry Performance Test unit at Gurgaon is conducting one layer and two broiler tests in a year. 
  • Recently Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved the Centrally Sponsored Scheme. "Poultry Development" from third year of XI Five Year Plan i.e. 2009-10 , at a total outlay of Rs. 150 crore. The Centrally Sponsored Scheme combines three components viz., 'Assistance to State Poultry Farms', (which is a continuing component) and two new components 'Rural Backward Poultry Development and 'Poultry Estates'. The administrative approval and scheme guidelines are being issued. 
  • The Scheme through its 'Assistance to State Poultry Farms' component aims at strengthening existing State poultry farms so as to enable them to provide inputs, mainly in terms of providing improved stocks suitable for rural backyard rearing. The 'Rural Backyard Poultry Development' component is expected to cover the needy Below Poverty Line section of society to mainly enable them to gain supplementary income and nutritional support. Entrepreneurship skills are expected to be improved through pilot component of 'Poultry Estates' which is meant primarily for educated, unemployed youth and small farmers with some margin money, for making a profitable venture out of various poultry related activities in a scientific, and bio-secure cluster approach. 
  • India and the neighbouring countries in the east are considered to be the original home of the well-known Red Jungle Fowl (Gallus gallus) from which the present day domestic birds have descended. The fowl population of India can be classified into two types - desi/indigenous and improved/exotic.The birds are raised mostly by the rural folks as a backyard enterprise. About 18 breeds of fowl have been documented. The status of most of these breeds except Aseel, Kadaknath, 
  • Kashmir Faverolla, Miri and Nicobari is not known. 
  • Most of the present day populations are commercial hybrids involving White Leghorn, Cornish, Barred Plymouth Rock, Rhode Island Red and Black Australorp. Some crossbred strains of fowl have been developed to use them for rural poultry production. Some of these are Giriraja, Vanaraja, Krishna–J, Yamuna, Kalinga Brown, Dhanraja, Mrityunjay, Cari Gold, Debendra, Nandanam-I, Girirani, Athula, Gramalakshmi, Gramapriya. Vanaraja.