Many people in northern Uganda are involved in many economic activities like crop farming, animal husbandry small and big retail in trade in a variety of goods. Of the many challenges that face our business people is lack of specialisation. This is far more serious in the rural communities. A peasant overloads himself with various of small entities that at the end do not allow him make much progress. A farmer like this one
besides keeping cattle also does some other activities for a living. This keeps the farmer unskilled throughout his life. As this 38-year-old gentleman does have his full attention on the animals, the output he gets is minimal--- just for survival and not thriving. Supposing a farmer like this were mentored, he would realize that he would need to do the followings:
- check on the genetics and breed of his animals
- decide whether to keep the animals for beef or milk
- endeavour to maintain high quality by maintaining good health, good feeding and housing
- get advise and help from a veterinary worker
But because of lack of valuable and relevant information on animal husbandry the guy's income is very low-- there is no sense of business in it-- it's just subsistence farming.He is handicapped by:
- inadequate capital
- lack of skilled labour force-- he works alone or is helped by his family members
- poor storage facilities for the milk produce
- poor marketing-- he rarely has enough milk to sell and slaughters his animals only when he is in a financial crisis.
He is so limited that he can not move from this
to this
Instead of good modern breeds of beef cattle
he still has low yield traditional African Zebu bull
