By Fatou B Cham, Information Officer, MoA
The Minister of Agriculture Amie Faburay, on Thursday 21st April 2022 visited the Poultry scheme in Giboro, for “backway” returnees which are under a project called ‘Building Resilience Against Food and Nutrition In The Sahel (P2RS), funded by the Africa Development Bank (AfDB) and the Government of the Gambia.
Ms. Faburay with the delegation from the CPCU, Directors from various Departments and the team from the Ministry of Agriculture, commenced a feasibility and monitoring tour of the project intervention sites in the West Coast (WCR), Lower River (LRR) and Central River Regions (CRR) respectively.
Speaking at the poultry farm, Ms. Faburay said the progress made on the poultry farm by these youth had shown their commitment and she will ensure that they are supported.
“Poultry farming is part of our agenda because the amount of poultry needs we import in this country is enormous and nowadays the price is even higher. So as a ministry we want to ensure that such issues are being addressed,” she elaborated.
According to the Minister, they deemed it necessary for people to know what the Ministry is up to and that is why they have embarked on the tour to generate visibility.
“The poultry farm will be expanded by the Ministry as per your request,” she assured and promised that her team will provide the poultry farm with tricycles as soon as possible, to ease the issue of transportation whilst the issue of vehicles will be looked into in no time.
CPCU Coordinator Abdoulie Touray, also commended members of the association while unveiling that pipeline projects are coming up which will address issues like these in the country.
Isatou Savage, Regional Livestock Director for WCR who also doubles as the Focal Point for P2RS, described the Minister’s visit as timely and important and said the poultry scheme initiative started in 2018, to “provide income and employment generation to migrant returnees”; that if expanded, it will create employment to not only the association members, but the nation as a whole.
Lamin Darboe, an irregular migrant returnee and President of the Backway Returnee Association expressed gratitude to the Minister and her delegation for visiting their poultry farm which to them, serves as a motivation. According to him, the association consists of forty (40) females and thirty (30) male members.
“Part of the reason we left our country to Libya was lack of employment. But now that we are engaged, we are not thinking of leaving our country again and with the experience gained through our journey, we can use that to develop the sector,” he said.
Mariama Bah, another migrant returnee on behalf of the association thanked Government for the support rendered them in the establishment of the poultry farm.
