File photo
The alarming COVID -19 situation has badly disrupted the
sacrificial animal market for Eid-ul-Azha in the last two years. As the
situation has improved a lot, the cattle farmers are expecting good business
this time.
About 1.21 crore sacrificial animals have been produced this
year, which is 33 per cent more than the total sales last year, according to
the Department of Livestock Services (DLS).
"Last year, traders sold a total of 90.83 lakh
sacrificial animals for Eid-ul-Azha, including 40.53 lakh cows and buffalos,
and 50.28 lakh goats and lambs, to get business worth Tk 46,000 crore amid the
pandemic," Zinat Sultana, deputy director (farm) of the DLS, said.
"As the pandemic threat is ending, we are expecting
much better festival sales and so, additional animals are being prepared,"
she said.
"More than 1 crore animals may be sold this year with
traders expecting to get more than Tk 50,000 crore collectively from the
festival market," Sultana added.
Of the 1.21 crore prepared for sacrifice, around 46.11 lakh
are cows and buffalos while 75.11 lakh are goats and lambs.
The DLS deputy director went on to say that the Eid market
is the biggest opportunity to do business for cattle farmers, who fatten up
their herds ahead of the festival season each year.
"Buyers want to get good looking animals for
sacrificing in the festival so the fattened animal business hits its peak ahead
of Eid," Sultana said.
Around 42.40 lakh of the 46.11 lakh cows and buffalos are
fattened while 33.48 lakh of the 75.11 lakh goats and lambs have been similarly
plumped.
"Local production will meet the demand this year as
additional animals have been prepared," she added.
Of the country's total production, Pabna and Sirajganj are
the biggest sources of fattened animals, as per DLS data.
"This year, a total of 172,729 cows, 111,325 of which
are fattened, have been prepared for sale in the festival market," said
Krishno Mohon Haldar, district livestock officer of Pabna.
In total, 605,774 sacrificial animals have prepared in the
district, he added.
Similarly, a total of 3.91 lakh sacrificial animals have
prepared in Sirajganj, of which 1.71 lakh are cattle, according to Gourango
Kumar Talukder, the district livestock officer of Sirajganj.
Of the cattle prepared, around 1.21 lakh are fattened, he
added.
Cattle fattening gets costly as feed prices soar.
Md Habib in Pabna's Balarampur village started cattle
farming a couple of years ago as a hobby but now, it is one of his biggest
businesses.
"This year, I have prepared 31 cows for sale with 22 of
them weighting between 600 and 900 kilogrammes," he said.
Habib bought the cows after Eid-ul-Azha last year and
followed a sufficiently organic nursing method to rear the cattle.
"But now I am worried about getting the expected
prices," said Habib, who bought each cow for Tk 1.2 lakh to Tk 1.5 lakh
and spent a further Tk 70,000 to Tk 1.25 lakh on nursing each of them for the
last 11 months.
The businessman said he used various nutritious food
ingredients with timely medical care following the guidelines of veterinarians
so that his cattle could grow up without disease.
"I need Tk 200 to Tk 225 for feed and labour costs of a
middle-sized cow each day while it costs Tk 300 to Tk 325 for big cows as the
price of dairy feed has been soaring rapidly in the last few months,"
Habib said.
"The price of all kinds of dairy feed has jumped by Tk
200 to Tk 400 in the last couple of months and so, fattening costs have risen
by 30 to 40 per cent compared to last year," said Raju Ahmed, a cattle
farmer of Ramkharua village in Sirajganj's Shahzadpur upazila.
Raju was forced to sell six of his cows a month ago after
failing to bear the burden of excessive maintenance costs.
Md Saiful Islam, secretary of the Bangladesh Dairy Farmers'
Association (Pabna unit), said each maund (37 kilogrammes) of dairy meat is selling
for about Tk 25,000 at present, which is not enough for fattened animals.
However, livestock officials claimed the price of
sacrificial animals is never fixed as it depends on supply, demand and choice
of the customers. Find more.
|Source: Online/SZK
Comment Now