Serological Survey of Porcine Brucella Infection in SouthEast, Nigeria

Porcine brucellosis, also called contagious abortion of swine is an infectious and zoonotic disease of swine caused by bacteria of the genus Brucella (Young, 1995). Brucella suis is the species found primarily in pigs. It is a zoonotic infection of domesticated and wild animals which humans(especially occupationally exposed workers), acquire by ingestion of improperly cooked contaminated pork, direct contact with infected animals or inhalation of infected aerosols (Radostits, 1995). Brucella infection in pigs is of wide spread occurrence, but the prevalence is low in most countries with the exception of South America and Southeast-Asia where the prevalence is high (Starnes et al., 1999). Pig production is drasticallyaffected by Brucella infection through abortion, birth of weak/unthrifty piglets, infertility and orchitis in the boar and these constitute serious economic losses (Ogundipe et al., 2001). Productivity of pigs in most countries is generally low due to high piglet mortality, slow growth rate,lack of adequate feed stuffs, ectoparasitism, trypanosomosis, helminthosis, lack of government' incentives, poor housing, lack of veterinary services and poor feed conversion ratio (Rekwot, 2003).This study was undertaken to determine the prevalence of Brucella infection in swine in southeast Nigeria

Economic Analysis of Broiler Production on On-farm Formulated and Commercial Feeds: A Case Study of Igabi Local Government Area of Kaduna State, Nigeria

Broiler birds are those kept and reared for meat production from day-old to about eight weeks of age for good quality tender meat as source of protein in human diet. However, the profit levels in poultry enterprises have been constrained by a number of factors critical among which is feed quality and cost. Feed is the major component of input cost  accounting for up to 70% (The poultry site, 2007) and 86-87% (Hassan et al., 2006) of the total variable cost of production. The high feed cost has largely been attributed to competition between man and animals for limited grains. The situation has been further exacerbated by high cost of operation of feed mills. Input costs and profitability of broiler production require a critical review of feed cost as a primary component. In recent years, farmers have increasingly been  formulating feeds for poultry using locally available feed stuffs. Records on the performance of farms using locally  formulated feeds in the study area are scanty. This study was carried out to compare profitability of broiler production using on-farm prepared and commercial feeds. Keywords: broiler production, high feed cost, on- farm formulation, commercial feed.Nigerian Veterinary Journal 32(2) 201