Green Thumb - 12
Green Thumb - 12
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00:00 Green Thumb Tuesdays is brought to you courtesy the Agricultural Development Bank.
00:04 Growing stronger together.
00:05 They're commonly raised as pets but read commercially rabbits can be a viable source
00:16 of income. However, hopping over that bridge has proven to be a challenge.
00:21 We have seen in our parts of the world where rabbit farming is being used to boost the economy
00:28 and to help persons especially on the lower level, the lower rungs of the ladder,
00:32 to create new income and supplement the income that they already have.
00:36 At their rabbitry in Wallafield, Sean Austin and his partner Sean McLean
00:41 tend to over 300 carrot crunchers. It's an enterprise promising profits and much more.
00:48 A lot of people don't see rabbit as an option, right, but rabbit meat has a lot to offer in
00:55 terms of its health benefits. It has a lot less fat content than most of the other meats on the
01:00 market. It's higher in protein than most of the other meats on the market.
01:03 The taste, depending on the preparation, it's very similar to chicken. You can prepare rabbit meat
01:13 any way that you prepare chickens. To maximise their income, value is added to rabbit farming
01:18 by products. Rabbit manure is, without sounding biased, is the best manure to use, simply because
01:26 one, it's a cold manure. It doesn't need to be composted before being used. It can be used right
01:31 away, as well as the fact that it's very high in nitrogen and phosphorus, so you see an almost
01:37 immediate difference in your plants when you utilise rabbit manure on them. According to
01:42 Marketing Director Sean McLean, sights have been set on export markets and to attain this,
01:48 they've invested in mechanising the sector. AI services, which is the artificial insemination,
01:54 right, and that is our service that if the industry really has to increase and really has to blossom,
02:00 farmers will have to get into the technology and that is one of the things that we have done. We
02:06 have embraced technology. If your interest in rabbit farming has been piqued, McLean has one
02:12 simple advice. Start right in terms of, have an idea of your costs, right, don't just go into it
02:17 blindly. Have an idea of your costing. Have an idea of how much rabbits that you actually want
02:23 to produce in terms of your output. Definitely look at having a market, right, and your market
02:29 could be as simple as friends and family, people in the community. Both Austin and McLean, however,
02:34 lamented the cost and quality of feed available. They said swift improvements were needed if the
02:40 forecasted growth in the industry is to be achieved. Jesse Ramdeo, CNC3 News.
02:46 Green Thumb Tuesdays was brought to you courtesy the Agricultural Development Bank.
02:51 Growing stronger together.