Africa-Press – Botswana. Botswana Meat Commission (BMC) is set to start operating Tsabong Multispecies Abattoir upon its completion in September.
The mega facility, which was constructed to the tune of P162 million, would be handed to BMC to run in the interim, to accord the district time to prepare a long term profitable plan of running the abattoir.
The district agricultural coordinator Ms Ikgopoleng Shabane said when engaging farmers and the business community at Tsabong Kgotla on Thursday that government had earmarked the facility to be run as an enterprise, therefore it was critical to ensure its long term sustainability to generate economic value.
Ms Shabane told Tsabong community members that expressions of interest had been published to invite companies to apply and they submitted.
However, after assessing their profiles and submissions, it was discovered that they did not meet requirements and a decision was taken to give BMC the facility while in the process of finding a suitable entrepreneur to run it.
Meanwhile, she said a retendering process had been effected to identify such an entity, adding that looking at the tendering process time frame, the project would take time. The plan, therefore was not to let the facility lie idle.
She highlighted that the Ministry of Agriculture continued to work with all relevant stakeholders to construct the abattoir.
Meanwhile frequent engagements with key stakeholders such as farmers, financiers, district authorities and Ministry of Entrepreneurship were being held to thrash out a profitable, sustainable long term plan of running of the abattoir.
Ms Shabane said currently the project stood at 90 per cent completion rate.
Most building components have been completed, painted and tiled, paving is almost complete and the abattoir new road link is currently under construction.
She stated that the project, which started in December 2020, should have been completed last year, but was delayed due to outbreak of COVID-19.
The contractor experienced shortage of steel, electrical components and other equipment which was ordered from Germany, Finland, Ireland, and South Africa.
She said no further delays and the abattoir was expected to be completed by September.
She said as the abattoir nears completion, they had started to engage all stakeholders to ensure that community and key stakeholders such as farmers and the business community were engaged in preparing for its operationalisation and were alive to the value chains brought about by its construction.
She said the facility was designed to slaughter 300 small stock per day, and 50-60 livestock and game per day, thus she encouraged farmers to produce good numbers to be able to sustain the abattoir in the long term.
Tsabong District acting head of animal production, Mr Oemeleng Mochanang said it was important for farmers to focus on producing quality stock in good numbers as currently the numbers were low and could not meet the demand.
He said between October and November 2022 they recorded 23 360 goats while sheep were 18 332 from Kokotsha to Struizendam and the numbers were not enough to meet the supply demand of the abattoir, hence the need for farmers to produce more.
The Scientific officer said in their research they had noted high mortality rate and low birth rate, hence the need for farmers to adopt best farming practices to improve production.
Some of the key challenges he said, they discovered that most of the farmers were not consistently present in their farms to closely monitor and manage them.
Mr Mochanang said farmers needed to be capacitated more to be able to increase their flock.
He also encouraged them to run their farms more professionally to be able to supply the Tsabong Multispecies Abattoir with quality stock in good numbers to ensure sustainability of the facility.
The acting head added that insufficient stock would render the facility too expensive to run.
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