May 18, 2021

Aviniger: from resistance to resilience

Animal Production Related

Staple Crops

Niger

Covid-19, floods, and bird flu: 2020 and 2021 remain years of challenges that have marked our poultry partner in Niger, Aviniger.

In September 2020, during the rainy season, the floods caused by heavy rains in Niger caused immeasurable losses to the Aviniger company - more than 1 billion CFA ( $+1.5 million) of losses were recorded.

While waiting to recover from this trying situation, the highly pathogenic H5N1 avian flu virus made its appearance in early 2021 in the largest poultry farm in Niger. Nearly 150,000 laying hens were killed by bird flu in the farm. This is a whole capital lost in less than two weeks. With zero hens currently on the farm, the company will have to wait up to eight months to have its first eggs. However, these different disasters constitute a challenge for the Aviniger-2SCALE partnership, even if this partnership is particularly based on another activity of the company: the production of feed for livestock and poultry.

Towards more yellow maize production

Indeed, the Aviniger company has two main activities. The first is egg production with 150,000 laying hens, and the second is the production of livestock and poultry feed, the main raw material being yellow corn. First, Aviniger imported its raw material from Bobo Dioulasso in Burkina Faso. However, due to the high cost of transport and border harassment, the company committed to reducing its imports and even substituting them with locally produced maize. This enabled the company to guarantee and develop a sustainable supply system for locally produced yellow maize, which is not well developed in Niger, through cooperatives operating in the various production basins of Niger.

To meet the challenges related to the production of yellow maize in Niger, the Aviniger-2SCALE partnership aims to support farmers with quality inputs in order to meet Aviniger's need for local yellow maize. To date, the need expressed by the champion to local farmers amounts to 4000 tons per year. To reach this quantity, the partnership first proceeded to identify the production zones and the farmers' groups. Five agribusiness clusters were formed in the production basins of Tillabéry, Dosso, Maradi, Agadez and Tahoua. A total of 3,500 farmers, including 1,000 women, will be involved in producing and selling better quality yellow maize to Aviniger.

A secured market for yellow maize farmers

With the establishment of the first irrigated plots of maize early this year, about 553 tons of yellow maize are expected to be harvested, according to the ARIDEL NGO acting as BSS (Business Support Service). For maize farmers, the opportunity to have a secured market allows them to revitalize yellow maize production, which has been put on hold for several years in favor of rice and other tubers production such as sweet potatoes and cassava because of the unfavorable selling price for farmers. Assoumane Garba, a yellow maize farmer and Chairman of the Mooriben farmers' groups in Gaya, said:

The production of yellow maize as a cash crop for Aviniger encourages us to go into large production. We have farmers with large areas up to 20 hectares. This is a significant potential to exploit in the production of yellow maize. Moreover, this market will also allow us to professionalize, to improve the quality of the yellow maize that we propose to the market, to better organize ourselves for the grouped sale. It will also encourage women and youth in our localities to take an interest in this crop and to use the local resources available like hydro-agricultural facilities and good rainfall in the Gaya area, among others.

In addition, the partnership's capacity-building program will improve farmers' knowledge through training in good agricultural practices and advisory support sessions, hence improving their productivity and incomes.

A sustainable future

Aviniger's current production capacity is 35,000 tons per year. By guaranteeing quality maize and a competitive price on the local market, Aviniger is able to purchase 500 tons of locally produced yellow maize. By 2023, the Aviniger-2SCALE partnership aims to establish a sustainable local yellow maize supply system for the production of quality livestock feed, and at the same time to organize the yellow maize value chain to make it more inclusive.

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