Cassava Flour As Native Chicken Feed at Laying Period

Cooperating agency for this topic:
Indonesian Assessment Institute for Agricultural Technology Central Java Province
Fax: 62 024 6924966
E-mail: aiatunr@semarang.wasantara.net.id, 2004-11-01

Native chicken in rural areas is a strategic commodity in improving farmer's income. Market demand for the products (meat and egg) is high, encouraging animal breeders to rear native chicken intensively. One problem encountered in developing the commodity is low productivity. This is attributed to low availability of high quality day-old chicken (DOC), limited knowledge on potential local feed resources, and fluctuation of feed price.

Feed Management

Feed is a vital component of semi-intensive and intensive native chicken rearing. Approximately, feed cost is 75% of total capital cost. Therefore, feed should be wisely managed to gain efficient and economic utilization. In rural areas, farmers generally give rations containing a mix of concentrate, milled corn and rice bran to their native chickens. In order to identify a low-cost substitute, the Central Java Indonesian Assessment Institute for Agricultural Technology (IAIAT) conducted an assessment on the use of cassava flour on chicken rations.

Cassava Flour

There are many kinds of local feed that can be found in rural areas. Cassava is abundant and cheap (Fig. 1). Some studies showed that 40% proportion of cassava flour could be used on ration composition to substitute for yellow corn (Table 1). It could be used up to 50% of ration composition to substitute for milled corn and concentrate on native chicken feed during laying period.

Benefits

Using cassava flour as substitute on chicken rations, average egg production is about 39,8 hen-days. Price of ration composition using cassava flour is Rp 1,372.00 per kg (US$ 0.14 per kg). This is lower by Rp 213.00 (US$ 0.02) from that of conventional ration formula composition (Rp 1,585.00 = US$ 0.16).

Index of Images

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  Figure 1 Local Feed Material (Cassava Chips)

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  Table 1 Feed Composition

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