Sto­ries by RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Cog­nisant that many fam­i­lies are find­ing it hard to put food on the ta­ble, Vi­jay Bhag­wat, a Moru­ga-based live­stock farmer, is giv­ing away 1,000 guinea chicks to cit­i­zens.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia in an ex­clu­sive in­ter­view, Bhag­wat said it was his way of giv­ing back to the coun­try that sup­port­ed him.

Bhag­wat, who tran­si­tioned to poul­try farm­ing sev­en years ago, said the guinea fowl was cheap­er to rear and was an ex­cel­lent source of eggs and meat.

With Trin­bag­o­ni­ans con­sum­ing over a mil­lion broil­er chick­ens week­ly, Bhag­wat said the guinea fowl of­fered a health­i­er and cheap­er al­ter­na­tive.

He said his jour­ney with poul­try farm­ing be­gan af­ter grad­u­at­ing from the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies.

In­trigued by the po­ten­tial ben­e­fits of guinea birds, Bhag­wat said he start­ed im­port­ing them from the Unit­ed States.

“Ini­tial­ly, im­port­ed guinea Keets/chicks stood at $200 per bird but since we start­ed rear­ing them our­selves, this cost has since dropped and we now sell at $15 per bird,” he ex­plained.

To­day, Bhag­wat breeds an im­pres­sive range of 16 chick­en va­ri­eties, in­clud­ing Rhode Is­land, New Hamp­shire, Blue Gi­ant, Black Gi­ant, Ayam Ce­mani, Cop­per Maran, Am­er­au­cana, Wyan­dotte, Turkens, Hy­brid, Buff Or­p­ing­ton, Light Brah­ma, and Ply­mouth Rock.

In­sist­ing that guinea chick­ens are an un­der­utilised re­source, Bhag­wat urged the lo­cal pop­u­la­tion to broad­en their culi­nary hori­zons and take ad­van­tage of his free of­fer.

He said guineas were a spe­cial­i­ty dish and can be pre­pared in the same way as reg­u­lar chick­en.

“The taste is ex­quis­ite, and the eggs con­tain twice the amount of pro­tein than reg­u­lar chick­en eggs,” he said. He added: “They lay eggs very con­sis­tent­ly from Feb­ru­ary to Oc­to­ber. The meat is low in fat and low in cho­les­terol. It is a cheap food source for the house­hold.”

Apart from be­ing a good source of meat and eggs, Bhag­wat said guinea chick­ens were al­so use­ful for pest con­trol.

“They con­trol a lot of pests like snails, slugs, ticks, cen­tipedes, scor­pi­ons etc. They are al­so a cheap bird to mind as they spend more time for­ag­ing,” he ex­plained.

But de­spite be­ing a ben­e­fi­cial re­source, he said the lo­cal util­i­sa­tion of guinea fowl has been low due to a lack of com­mer­cial quan­ti­ties.

The young farmer, who has suc­cess­ful­ly man­aged to low­er the cost of guinea chick­ens to $15 per bird, said he re­mains hope­ful of change.

He at­trib­uted his suc­cess in re­duc­ing prices to economies of scale and his com­mit­ment to mak­ing nu­tri­tious food more ac­ces­si­ble to or­di­nary peo­ple amidst ris­ing costs of fu­el and labour and feeds for his poul­try.

And in the face of in­creased eco­nom­ic hard­ships for many fam­i­lies, Bhag­wat said he has kept his prices low.

“We have been re­duc­ing prices de­lib­er­ate­ly be­cause we want to meet the pock­et of the av­er­age per­son. This is why we de­cid­ed to give back to our peo­ple. Rear­ing the guinea fowl is easy if you have the space,” he said.

Bhag­wat’s hatch­ery ac­com­mo­dates 4,500 eggs but he said there is now a re­gion­al de­mand for the guinea chicks.

“We have peo­ple in Guyana, Suri­name and St Vin­cent and oth­er is­lands check­ing us to sup­ply them with guineas. We want to ex­port to the Caribbean. We are at a point where for­eign ex­change is an is­sue, but if we ex­port the birds, we can gen­er­ate forex,” he ex­plained.

Adding to their many ben­e­fits, Bhag­wat said guinea birds con­tribute to house­hold se­cu­ri­ty.

“Known as sen­tinel birds, they are alert to their en­vi­ron­ment and can no­ti­fy you of any un­fa­mil­iar pres­ence in your yard,” he said.

Bhag­wat called on cit­i­zens to con­sid­er rear­ing guinea birds not just for their meat and eggs, say­ing these ex­cel­lent free-range birds are a valu­able as­set to the com­mu­ni­ty.

Any­one want­i­ng free chicks can What­sApp Bhag­wat at 369-1354.