‘No antibiotic used in Bangladesh’s poultry’

Bangladesh's poultry industry operators and farmers use prebiotic, probiotic and essential oil to help to producing good quality meat and egg, instead of antibiotic, said a top leader of poultry industry today.

Prebiotics are specialised plant fibres, which help in stimulating healthy bacteria whereas probiotics are live microorganisms that intend to have health benefits. And essential oils are concentrated extractions from plants.

"There is firm belief among consumers that we use antibiotic. But reality is we are using prebiotic, probiotic and essential oil. Now consumers can buy eggs and chicken meat with guarantee from the market if they want," said Moshiur Rahman, president of the Bangladesh branch of the World's Poultry Science Association (WPSA).

He made the remark on the opening day of a two-day international seminar on poultry in Dhaka, said a press release.

Rahman said Bangladesh's poultry industry has achieved notable success in the last three decades.

The poultry industry is now not only a source of animal protein, but also the local farms produce a huge amount of biogas, organic fertiliser and even electricity, said Rahman, who is also the managing director of Paragon Group.

He said an increased number of five-star hotels and international food chains are now using chicken and meat produced in Bangladesh, whereas they used to source the two items from abroad.

He said the price of poultry feed raw materials has risen abnormally after the Ukraine-Russia war, which has fuelled the production cost of chicken and meat in Bangladesh.

Everyone is blaming the feed millers for the rise in poultry prices, but the reality is they are hardly making any profit now, said Shamsul Arefin Khaled, president of executive committee of the Feed Industries Association of Bangladesh.

The prices of one-day-old chicks have been very low for the last one year, he said.

So, it is necessary to find out the amount of actual demand for poultry items and then go for their production, he said.

"Otherwise poultry prices will become unstable as sometimes there will be overproduction and sometimes underproduction. These will ultimately affect both the poultry farmers and consumers."

Bangladesh currently has 60 lakh poultry farmers.