Zambia Agribusiness Society

1. Make a business plan. Do a SWOT analysis of yourself and the cattle industry you will be entering. Plan what kind of cows you want looking at breeds, and what kind of farm you wish to operate. Keep in mind to start small. Try to aim for being a low-cost producer, as that is the surest way to make money, and the best way to start if you don’t have much to begin with! 2. Locate the area where you want to raise cattle. This is important because you need to find a location that you are used to or really like and are confident you can raise your animals in. 3. Research then purchase the type of facilities, equipment and machinery necessary for the type of cattle you have chosen to raise. Analyse your operation and your financial situation to see what you need (not what you want) for current facilities, equipment and machinery. Fencing, watering facilities, feed bunks/troughs or bale feeders is priority above all other assets needed. 4. Determine the type of cattle you want to...

Indigenous chickens do not have desirable genetic characteristics compared to commercial breeds. They take longer to mature, have poor food conversion ratio, do not lay a lot of eggs among others. However, there are areas where the indigenous chickens have certain strong points. They generally have better resistance to diseases, produce nutritious and sweet tasting poultry products and the meat is often tender with more muscles than fat. However, the time and long-term cost for rearing indigenous chickens may not justify doing this on a commercial scale. Still, there ways to improve the system so as to make the most of your indigenous chickens ensuring they put on weight fast and offer better yields. Let’s look at some of the ways in which you can make your indigenous chickens grow faster and produce more. How to Make Indigenous Chickens Grow Fast 1. Feed High Protein Food While chicken needs a lot of carbs to meet their energy needs and make them put on weight, a high protein diet can...

Peppers have lots of potential. You can grow different colours, sell the plants, market to restaurants, host tastings and make value-added products. Peppers don’t quite give you as many options as, say, garlic , but here are a few ways you might not have considered for peppers to bring something new to your market table, and your wholesale customers. 1. Sell pepper plants Almost invariably, because I love to grow peppers, I start more plants than I need. But this works out well because selling starts is relatively easy so long as the plants look healthy and are in a nice package. Plants not only make a good addition to the early season market table, but they are a good way to start engaging the first customers of the year and getting them interested in your goods. 2. Grow ornamental peppers If you really enjoy selling plants, you could consider growing some decorative, ornamental pepper plants. These are multi-coloured peppers whose plants can be sold young with the promise o...

When most people think of agriculture in Africa, images of poor and overworked farmers with crude tools on a rural farm readily come to mind. Many, especially young Africans, still think that agribusiness is a poor man’s occupation. Nowadays everybody wants a white-collar office job in the city. Agribusiness is hardly on anyone’s mind. Did you know that Africa sits on an agribusiness goldmine but most people just don’t see it? If you’re one of the blind, allow me to open your eyes with a few exciting facts you need to know about agribusiness in Africa: 1.     Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, recently invested $1 billion in rice production. Every year, Africa spends billions of dollars on rice imports, and Dangote wants a slice of the market. 2.     Since 2009, investors in the USA, Europe, Middle East and Asia have been buying and leasing millions of hectares of African land for agricultural purposes. Many people may not know it but there’s a tren...

Einstein Sibanda in his chicken shed at the Rocklands Farm. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks Einstein Sibanda is a poultry farmer in Rocklands, Simonstown and owns a business called Hands-on Entrepreneur. He has 1700 chickens on the two-hectare free-range farm and produces 1600 eggs per day, inspiring the catchy produce name, ‘Einstein’s Eggs’. Originally from Zimbabwe, Einstein moved to South Africa in 2006 and studied Agriculture in order to upskill himself in the farming sector, spending three years at Living Hope (an umbrella of ministry projects engaged in various forms of community service). “Where I come from, people engage in agriculture only for family use, not really for commercial purposes. After finishing my schooling, I decided to take agriculture further and make it my career,” Einstein said. “At Living Hope, I grew tomatoes and was also involved in chicken farming, which I then decided to take further.” The free range chicken farm in Simon’s Town. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks “I rente...

Starting a pig farm is one project that can bring satisfaction and joy to the farmers if it is done well. I quite remember the happiness I felt when I started mine two years ago. It was experimental, just wanted to start something because I had researched for about two years. Downloaded a lot of pig farming staff on YouTube. But my first mistake was that I took the project as a hobby. Pig farming is a serious business that needs time, attention and cash. 1. Pig Farming is Serious Business Yes, pig farming is a serious business and nobody starts a business to lose. From the inception of the project, you should have it at the back of your mind that you are investing to make returns. In this business, volumes count if you want to see a meaningful return on your investment. So if you really want to make meaningful returns, start with 20 to 50 sows so that you can increase your herd’s size to 500 within a year. Last month when I supplied 55 pigs to a local mall, it got finished in one w...

With the ease of increasing population, the food requirement of the world is also increasing rapidly. And Wheat is very important food crop that plays a vital role in meeting the world food requirement. It is believed that they were first grown about 10,000 years ago and are the first plants which are cultivated for food. Wheat is also healthy and nutritious food that is beneficiary in keeping us healthy. And most of the people use to grow only little stock of it to meet only their own food requirement. In the Asian continent, the European continent, and the African continent, wheat farming or growing wheat had spread by about 4,000 B.C. And with the increasing popularity across the world, new variety of wheat had been created to increase the production capacity and quality of food. Usually, farmers select kernels for growing it from their own & best wheat plants, which he had grown the previous year. And this growing method of traditional growers passes the quality seeds from ...