International Journal of
Livestock Production

  • Abbreviation: Int. J. Livest. Prod.
  • Language: English
  • ISSN: 2141-2448
  • DOI: 10.5897/IJLP
  • Start Year: 2009
  • Published Articles: 290

Article in Press

Evaluation of production and reproduction performance of village chicken, egg quality traits and marketing system in Dedo district, Jimma zone, South West Ethiopia

Amanuel Bekuma

  •  Received: 19 February 2019
  •  Accepted: 21 March 2019
The study was conducted to evaluate production and reproduction performance of village chicken and egg quality traits and marketing system in Dedo district, Jimma zone, Southwest Ethiopia. Three different agro- ecologies (high, mid and lowlands) of the district were purposively selected based on poultry population and accessibility. Stratified probability random sampling method was followed to select two peasant associations (PA) from each of the three agro-ecology and 30 households from each of the six PAs, thus a total of 180 (6x30) households (hh) were used to collect the required data for production and reproduction performance and a total of 240 fresh eggs (80 from each agro-ecology) were purchased from selected farmers on contractual bases at household level to for analyzing egg quality. The growth performance and survival rate of chicks hatched from eggs collected from the study area were found to be poor. This study also showed that eggs collected from the study area were poor in most of the egg quality parameters, this might be poor storage period and condition of eggs. Chicken and egg is marketed informally, (95%) women and children are responsible for the management and marketing of chickens. Appropriate intervention in health care and control of predators and Provision of better extension service, credit schemes and training opportunities tends to result in increased productivity of village poultry in the Dedo district. Further investigation in to the constraints and potential of indigenous chicken based village poultry seems to be the future direction of research in the study area. Dedo district, egg quality, village chicken, production and reproduction performance

Keywords: Dedo district, egg quality, village chicken, production and reproduction performance