Five thousand chickens have been imported into the country to help former youth gangsters start up a poultry farm.
According to the Cabinet notes, the chickens will be fed a special diet which will allow some of them to be harvested for meat within 30 days, while some chicks will become layer hens that can lay multiple eggs per day.
According to the Chief of Staff in the Prime Minister’s Office, Ambassador Lionel Hurst, both the chicken meat and the eggs will be sold locally.
“I don’t think that decision about how many for meat and how many for eggs has yet been made, but we know that in in all likelihood maybe half of each,” he stated during the post Cabinet press briefing.
“Some may very likely be free range and some are likely to be penned; in fact, we are building pens at the moment to enable the 5,000 chicks to live in a greater space.”
The young men who will be caring for the birds are former members of two youth gangs operating in Antigua, before Prime Minister Gaston Browne brokered a truce between the two warring factions and oversaw their return to education and employment in various capacities.
The initiative is being overseen by Dr Patrick Lay, the government’s special advisor on agriculture who has also assisted the Prime Minister’s farm and who is providing instruction to the participants at no cost.
“He too has an interest in ensuring that young men in Antigua and Barbuda become productive, and even though it is just a small percentage,” Ambassador Hurst said.
