Why 1.5m birds were killed in Plateau

About 1.5 million birds belonging to 438 farmers were affected by the outbreak of Avian Influenza in the first quarter of this year, the Managing Director, Grand Cereals Limited, Mr. Layi Oyatoki, has disclosed.

Oyatoki also explained that the affected birds were killed to avoid the spread of the disease, adding that many farmers were as a result, put out of business as their means of livelihood were destroyed.

 Scenes of destruction

He said his organization had initiated an insurance scheme to insure farms against the disease and encouraged farmers to key into the scheme, so they could have something to fall back on in the event of any outbreak.

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He further stated that the insurance was free for farmers who had up to 500 birds and that the organization would pay the premium on their behalf, provided they used Grand Cereals’ feed (vital feed) consistently.

He said: “Our intention is to cover any farmer using vital feed; we don’t have a ceiling for the number of farmers that we intend to cover

‘’The Nigeria Agricultural Insurance Corporation, NAIC, is covering the cost of raising a bird from pullet to lay at the cost of N1,450 per bird, and the company is paying the premium of four percent of the amount.

“When there is an incident, Grand Cereals would be the one to get the insurance company to pay the claim to the farmer. It is easier for the company to pursue the claim on behalf of the farmers than the farmers doing it themselves and the claim settlement would be prompt.

“We want to tell farmers that we are a company that cares; we are not just traders, we are manufacturers and we believe that as feed manufacturer, if there are no birds, then we will not be in business

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