How to start pig farming business in Nigeria - Startuppreneur
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How to start pig farming business in Nigeria

In agriculture business there are three major businesses that can give multiple returns on investment and pig business is part of them.

It is very lucrative though many people see it as a dirty business that is far from white collar job, which is a good thing for those considering as a business because there is low competition and you don’t have to worry about demand also marketing is not a problem since you can sell your pig locally or export it.

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The purpose of this article is to show you step by step guide of starting your own pig farming business, cost of starting it, and challenges.
While this article contains everything you need to start a pig business you still need to consult a professional that will physically guide you through.

Breed of pig in Nigeria
Breed is the group of animal with the same morphological characteristics.

Since Nigeria local pig do not perform well it is imperative to rare foreign breed, which is why It is very important to know deferent breed of pig that can adapt well to Nigeria environment and that can go along with your niche, this will be explain in the next chapter.

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Below are the pigs that can adapt well to Nigeria environment.

  • Duroc
  • Hampshire
  • Large white
  • Landrace
  • Berkshire
  • Yorkshire

Type of piggery enterprises or niche in Nigeria

In piggery there are deferent niche you can go into, though it is possible to take all the niches at once you shouldn’t if you don’t have the necessary capital and knowledge.

It is better to take one and grow from there.

1) Farrow to finish
In this niche you keep some sow (female pig) that will produce piglet, you then rear the piglet to finish (mature) and sell them off.

2) Farrowing only
Here instead of rearing piglet produce to finisher, you sell them off at weaners, usually when they reach three months of age

3) Finishing
This is easy; you buy weaners, fatten them up to finisher and sold them off, it can be batch by batch or all in all out.

All in all out; is when you buy set of weaners, rear them for certain months and sell all of them together regardless of their weight

While in batch by batch you rear different set of pig such that each set is sold off every one or two month

Steps to starting pig farming business in Nigeria

1) Knowledge and skill
Piggery farming requires knowledge of how to manage pig and how to perform deferent piggery operation.

Go out and seek a farm to learn in an out of pig farming or you can have one on one lesson in your farm, all this will not take more than 3 month.

Another way to go about it if you don’t have time is to hire professional as your manager but I tell you this option may later backfire

2) Feasibility study

Because pig farming is profitable in one location does not mean it will be profitable in another location, conduct feasibility study that will let you know if the business will be profitable and how profitable it will be.

You should answer the following question during your feasibility study

  • Who are your target customers?
  • What is your unique selling preposition?
  • Is there competitors and how do you plan to beat them?
  • What is the average industry cost and revenue?
  • Get your fact right you need to know if the profit margin is what you can go after.

3) Location
Usually farm is located far from residential area therefore this should not cause too much of deliberation.

Do you want to start your piggery in isolated place or with likeminded entrepreneur that are doing the same business as you? Isolating yourself is good especially for disease prevention but if you are just starting out you should go to place like “Oke aro” (Lagos) where you will see people to help you out in case of problem.

4) Business plan
Don’t do your business like a layman; make a different by writing a business plan that will contain your mission and vision for your business and how you will achieve it.

Though it is hard to see business plan that will exceed three years, you can update it constantly and if you pivot that means you will have to write another one, to prevent this write a single page business plan that will only serve a s a direction but you can’t use it to obtain loan.

5) Registration
You can pend this till you become big. But have it in mind that you will register with CAC (Corporate Affairs Commission) and other government agency to prevent future confrontation.

6) Building
Pig farm business does not require big houses just 6 coaches of block in all side with a roof held firm by wooden pillar.

Construct the house such that there is enough space that will make feeding and management easy.

The roof should be made of material that does not conserve heat so that there will be a maximum air circulation.

7) Placing of pig in pig house
Follow the below on how to group your pig in a pen

  • Sow should be housed together
  • Boar should be kept separate
  • Lactating sow should be kept separate
  • Provide a creep area where sucking piglet can feed

8) Feeding
Feeding take between 60% and 80% of the cost of production therefore feeding should not be taking with levity hands. In pig production it is garbage in garbage out, whatever you feed them is what you will reap as profit so feed them well and correctly this will also ensure efficient feed utilization and improve production.

Your feed should contain the following nutrient in the right proportion

  • Digestible energy
  • Proteins
  • Mineral
  • Vitamin

Below are different feed sources where you can get the require nutrient

Energy sources

  • Grain
  • Maize
  • Millet
  • Wheat
  • Barley
  • Sorghum

Grain by produce

  • Wheat bran
  • Wheat oval
  • Corn oval
  • Maize cob
  • Rice bran

Protein source

  • Oilcake meal
  • Soybean
  • Groundnut cake

Animal protein

  • Blood meal
  • Fishmeal
  • Carcass

Mineral source

  • Lime
  • Dicalcium phosphate
  • Bone meal

Management practices
Having healthy and disease free farm depend on management practice.

Good management practice can prevent drug usage therefore reducing cost of production.

Below are some the management practice you need to pay attention to

Feed your pig at appropriate time

Clean your pen every day and make sure the surroundings are clean

Put footbath in front of each pen where visitors can deep their leg to prevent disease from entering your farm

Pigs are scavengers; they can eat anything so do not put harmful material In the pen.

Build a wallow inside each pen where pig can cool off

Provide clean water for drinking and wallowing

9) Marketing
There is always demand for pig therefore you should have little problem selling your pig. Your marketing should begin from the onset of stocking.

Locate local buyer or exporter if it proof abortive, connect with farmers association.
You can use the following medium to advertise your business

Social media

Social media is one of the best advertisement medium for agric business and you know what, it is free.

Set up a social media account and posting your animal/ farm picture with content that will describe it. Trust me in less than one month you will receive order that you won’t be a bale to meet

Flyers and logo
Flyers are good when you are just starting out. Once you print it the first person to give are your friends and family; they will help you to distribute it to their friends.

Branding of car
If you have vehicle, brand it with your logo and address

Create a website and content
If you want to take your business to another stage, create business with content that will drive traffic to it. Those traffic will later convert to customer.

To create website and content you can contact us

10) Stocking
The next thing is to stock your farm. When buying pig go with a professional because it might be difficult for starter to know good pig and bad pigs will crumble your business.

To know good pig take note of the following

  • A good pig will be sharp not dull
  • Do not buy limped pig
  • Do not buy pig with eye and nose discharge

Staffing
You can’t do the work alone you will need to staff but be careful when hiring, hire employee that have experience in pig farming and make sure you provide staff quarters.

Workers are known to be thieve create a system that will prevent this.

Challenges/ disadvantage of pig farming business in Nigeria

1) Disease
Major challenges or disadvantages of pig business is disease, you can only prevent it if you set a good management practices.

Also When bringing new pig to your farm do not take them directly into the pen instead put them in a quarantine pen and keep them there for some days to see if they will come down with disease

2) Cannibalism
If a dams (mother pig) are not feed well they will eat their piglet.

Solution
Apart from not feeding pig well, cannibalism can also be hereditary, what you can do after feeding them very is to require the pedigree chat of your pig when sourcing them, this will let you know what type of hereditary disease a particular pig will have.

3) Crushing
Due to weight of pig, they can crush the youngling, that is why you need to group or place your pig according to how I stated above.

5) Return on pig takes time
At least you will count 4 month before you can see return in any niche of pig production. What you can do is to exercise patient, give it time and you will see your return.

6) Foul smell
If you are serious with animal husbandry you should not see this as a challenge or disadvantage, but if you do, don’t worry as you go on in your farming endeavor, you get used to it.

Cost of starting a pig farm in Nigeria
As I have stated above there are many niches of pig farming, I will only do analysis for pig finishing niche, to remind you in pig finishing niche you buy weaners and sell them off when they reach adult.

Let say you house 20 weaners
They will take 3 to 4 month before reaching adult

1 weaner = #15,000
Feeding = 300,000
Transport = 100,000
Drugs = 100,000
Salary = 200,000
Total = 1,650,000

Fixed cost
Building = 1,000,0000
Land = 200,000
Equipment = 1,000,000
Total = 1300,000

Cost of starting = #2,950,000

Though it depend on scale of production and niche cost of starting pig farming should be around #500,000 to #5,000,000

How profitable is pig farming business
Pig farming is very lucrative, you can make 30% to 60% profit margin i.e. if your cost of production is #1 million you can have # 300,000 to #600,000 as profit.

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