Rural Poultry Production in Ondo South Senatorial District Area of Ondo State, Nigeria

A large proportion of the poultry population in Nigeria come from rural areas in spite of the dearth of knowledge on their demographic statistics, management practices, disease control methods ,their potentials and level of Government intervention in the business. The need to obtain baseline information on rural poultry with respect to their population and the production potentials of the indigenous chicken under the village conditions in Ondo Area formed the basis for this study. Data used were collected from randomly sampled rural poultry farmers in three LGA in Ondo South Senatorial District of Ondo state using well structured questionnaire schedule. The areas comprise of rural villages in the Southern and North eastern parts of Ondo. Data were analyzed by means of simple average and percentages. Results showed that able-bodied men and mostly women are involved in rural poultry business and the flock is made up of about 83% chicken population. It was also revealed that Newcastle was the principal disease decimating the flock although farmers were ignorant of this fact and the tendency to abuse the use of drugs was rampant. Some major problems associated with rural poultry production potentials were identified and relevant solutions centering on changes in the management systems and dedicated support from various governments were suggested