The smell of chicken manure mixed with the squawking of birds is the perfect mixture of chaos for Singa Pathika's small farm.
In Orissa, India, many small-scale farmers have to find other jobs in order to supplement their otherwise meager income.
Singa decided to become a chicken farmer. During peak seasons, he could earn a significant income from selling the chickens—but only if they lived long enough to sell. “When one chicken gets sick, soon they all do and die one by one,” Singa explains.
Losing a flock of chickens is worse than just losing the income you would get from selling them. Chickens are an investment of money, time, and resources. By the time an entire flock of chickens dies from an illness, farmers have lost everything they put into raising them.
“There is a veterinarian, but he only comes when he wants and often charges more to heal the illness than the price of the chicken!” Singa says, clearly upset over the corruption of the business. “Calling the vet is immensely risky, but to support my family I had to do something.”
So he did.
Tearfund’s local partner was hosting a livestock and poultry management training nearby, and Singa signed up without hesitation. The training covered disease management, including which medications could help.
Confident and equipped with his new knowledge, Singa arrived home to find that two of his chickens had caught a disease called Ranikhet. Usually fatal if left untreated, Singa got to work to heal the chickens. He purchased the correct medicine, and a few days later they were healed.
“I didn’t think he would actually be able to heal the chickens,” Singa’s wife shares. “Illness was usually fatal! But he knew exactly what he needed to heal them!”
Since the training, Singa proudly refers to himself as a ‘livestock doctor,’ and has a healthy flock of chickens to prove it!
