New Technology Helps Farmer Dramatically Increase Income

Fintrac

"Surehatch made me see the light, you have given us hope again."

It’s not every day that a smallholder sells his most prized possession in order to buy a new technology that promises to improve his productivity in the future. Andrew Mwangangi, a smallholder from Machakos County, Kenya, decided to take such a risk after attending a workshop on poultry management delivered by Surehatch.

Surehatch sells egg incubators designed for smallholders that can drastically improve chicken productivity. With support from Feed the Future Partnering for Innovation, Surehatch is scaling up delivery and training to small-scale poultry farmers in rural Kenya.

Over the last two years Andrew had built up a stock of 46 chickens, each providing him with roughly 120 eggs per week, which he sells to his neighbors for an average weekly income of $10, his sole source of income. But after attending the Surehatch training, Andrew began looking at his poultry investment in a different light.

Surehatch’s poultry workshop demonstrates the income-earning potential of chicks over that of selling eggs immediately. By hatching some of the eggs, Andrew stood to make more than 10 times the income per egg. However, to purchase the incubator, Andrew had to sell almost half of his egg-laying chickens. Working closely with Surehatch, Andrew felt ready to take the risk.

Three weeks after purchase, Andrew’s incubator hatched 35 chicks, which he immediately sold for a total of $35. Realizing the market demand, Andrew quickly loaded another batch of eggs into the incubator and again was able to sell all the chicks in record time. He now takes orders from customers and is planning on investing in a second incubator to keep up with demand.

Andrew now sells chicks every month at his local market. He is producing an average of 35 chickens per month, enabling him to sell some as day-old chicks, rear some to fully grown birds, and use some of them to produce eggs to sell. With these three income streams, Andrew is able to buy food for his family and have enough money left at the end of the month to send his daughter to school, something he was unable to do before attending the Surehatch training.

“Surehatch made me see the light, you have given us hope again,” he said.