VILLAGE CHICKEN PRODUCTION PRACTICES, MARKETING AND EGG QUALITY TRAITS IN DIFFERENT AGRO-ECOLOGIES OF KERSA DISTRICT; EAST HARARGHE ZONE, ETHIOPIA

This study was conducted in three agro-ecologies of Kersa district to generate information on the existing production system, marketing and egg quality traits of indigenous village chicken. A total of 120 indigenous chicken owners from Highland, Midland and Lowland and 51 market participants from the three selected market places (Lange, Kersa and Woter) were included in the study. A two stage purposive sampling (for agro-ecology and RK selection) and a random sampling technique to select HH’s were used. For marketing survey, a randomly selected sellers, buyers and intermediaries were interviewed from each of the three selected market places and market chain of village chicken and eggs in the district was mapped accordingly. A total of 330 eggs from the interviewed chicken owners in the district and 180 eggs from three market places were collected to evaluate egg quality traits of village chickens. All the data collected were analyzed using SPSS and SAS. The result of the study showed that the average chicken holding in the area was 9.92 birds per HH. Majority of the respondents (91.7%) in the study area practiced scavenging with supplementation. The vast majority of the respondents (93.3%) also provided water for their chicken. None of the interviewed HH’s had separate poultry house. The result of the study also revealed that Newcastle disease (94.2%) was the most dominant chicken disease followed by Coccidiosis (5.8%). Mean age at first egg, clutches per year and clutch length were 7.35±0.06 months, 3.99±0.07 and 19.77±0.17 days, respectively. Average eggs per hen per clutch was 14.64±0.20 with annual egg production of 57.93±1.09 eggs per bird. The overall mean hatchability (%) and chick mortality (%) were 76.30±0.57 and 43.04±0.48, respectively. Village chicken were predominantly possessed (98.3%) and managed (71.7%) by women. Majority of the respondents (92.5%) kept chicken for sale as an immediate source of cash for basic HH necessities of the owners. 84.2% and 40.8% of the respondents also highlighted that they kept chicken for home consumption and stock replacement, respectively. The overall mean egg weight, shell thickness, albumin height, xvi yolk height, albumin weight, yolk weight and egg shell weight were 41.9 g, 0.29 mm, 4.75 mm, 14.91 mm, 21.16 g, 14.86 g and 4.50 g, respectively. The overall mean yolk colour value was 10.01and average Haugh unit score was 73.83. In general, village chickens in the district showed low performance in terms of the most important production traits, though a substantial opportunity is available for improvement. Training and education of women, strong extension service delivery regarding husbandry practices, enhancing access to veterinary services, improvement of market infrastructure and proper handling of eggs are recommended to boost up the current low performance of village chickens in the district.