The challenges of Ghana’s poultry industry according to some industry insiders are due to the failure of successive governments to draw up coherent policies to curtail the importation of poultry products into the country. According to the former Chairman of the Ghana National Association of Poultry Farmers, Ken Quartey, the anticipated growth in the poultry industry has not materialized yet after several years now. This he said is seriously affecting the poultry industry. He noted that the market for layer birds is stagnating while that for broiler birds has severely regressed. He said it was very disappointing that the poultry industry has been plagued by large imports of day old chickens, eggs and feed despite the availability of local birds which are more sumptuous, nutritious and healthy. Speaking on Multi TV’s current affairs show pm: EXPRESS, Mr. Quartey also raised about the situation where people buy live birds to prepare at home when the dealers could easily dress the birds for sale. A Director at Finatrade, John Awuni who was also on the show said statistics are needed to develop policies but noted that for the poultry industry, “the last time any survey was carried out was in 1995 and there is no available statistics to readily show the gap, deficit, production and consumption levels” adding that when statistics are flawed or not available, they affect policies for development. According to him, both politicians and technocrats have not helped the fortunes of the sector since they have been spewing nothing but political rhetoric about the sector. Mr. Awuni pointed out that whereas the price of a local bird is already very expensive, their feed - yellow maize – is imported because unfortunately Ghana does not produce yellow corn in large quantities to be able to feed into industry. “The government comes in, puts a ban – no importation of yellow corn, so humans and the poultry compete for the white corn sending prices very high” he said. He noted that currently, a 3 kilo broiler sells at GH¢ 20 on the market and asked “how many of us can afford 20 cedis bird on our table literally. Sadly the imported one of same kilo is going for 12 cedis a price which includes about 40% of import duties”. Ken Quartey said despite the unavailability of statistics to give a reflection of consumption rate, it can be deduced from the consistent increase in imports over the last 8 years that consumption per capita now is about 200,000 tons per annum adding that Ghana does not even produce 1 percent of broilers. “The cost of production is pushing up the high cost of poultry in the country”, he surmised. On how the poultry industry arrived at its current appalling state, Mr. Quartey recalled that it started in 1992 when there was a massive dumping of beef in Ghana as a result of the large beef stocks in Europe which unfortunately was then cheaper than chicken. This problem he recalled persisted for a number of years with the resultant effect being poultry farmers unable to sell their produce at sustained periods. Though he believes the industry has not grown completely hopeless, he bemoaned the lack of coherent policies to address the issues. He explained that the cost of poultry is on the rise in the country because the average local poultry farmer produces broiler birds twice a year when they can do it six times a year using six and a half weeks per production. But should a farmer plan to go by the six and a half week production period, Mr. Quartey noted that the farmer will face yet another challenge with funding. He thus called on government to come out with coherent policies to salvage the sector “though it’s apparent so for that they are bereft of any strategy”.