BILL GATES , CHICKENS AND ECONOMIC GROWTH.

Dr. Batamaka Somé, an anthropologist from Burkina Faso who has worked with Gates foundation, has spent much of his career studying the economic impact of raising chickens in his home country. He explains the importance of chicken to the economy of Burkina Faso in the video. Bill Gates asks" If you were living on $2 a day, what would you do to improve your life? That’s a real question for the nearly 1 billion people living in extreme poverty today. There’s no single right answer, of course, and poverty looks different in different places. But through my work with the foundation, I’ve met many people in poor countries who raise chickens, and I have learned a lot about the ins and outs of owning these birds. (As a city boy from Seattle, I had a lot to learn!) It’s pretty clear to me that just about anyone who’s living in extreme poverty is better off if they have chickens. In fact, if I were in their shoes, that’s what I would do—I would raise chickens. Here’s why: 1) They are easy and inexpensive to take care of. Many breeds can eat whatever they find on the ground (although it’s better if you can feed them, because they’ll grow faster). Hens need some kind of shelter where they can nest, and as your flock grows, you might want some wood and wire to make a coop. Finally, chickens need a few vaccines. The one that prevents the deadly Newcastle disease costs less than 20 cents. 2) They’re a good investment. Suppose a new farmer starts with five hens. One of her neighbors owns a rooster to fertilize the hens’ eggs. After three months, she can have a flock of 40 chicks. Eventually, with a sale price of $5 per chicken—which is typical in West Africa—she can earn more than $1,000 a year, versus the extreme-poverty line of about $700 a year. 3)They help keep children healthy. Malnutrition kills more than 3.1 million children a year. Although eating more eggs—which are rich in protein and other nutrients—can help fight malnutrition, many farmers with small flocks find that it’s more economical to let the eggs hatch, sell the chicks, and use the money to buy nutritious food. But if a farmer’s flock is big enough to give her extra eggs, or if she ends up with a few broken ones, she may decide to cook them for her family. 4)They empower women. Because chickens are small and typically stay close to home, many cultures regard them as a woman’s animal, in contrast to larger livestock like goats or cows. Women who sell chickens are likely to reinvest the profits in their families. The Gates foundation is betting on chicken; alongside partners throughout sub-Saharan Africa, we are working to create sustainable market systems for poultry. It’s especially important for these systems to make sure farmers can buy birds that have been properly vaccinated and are well suited to the local growing conditions. Our goal: to eventually help 30 percent of the rural families in sub-Saharan Africa raise improved breeds of vaccinated chickens, up from just 5 percent now. Bill Gates said "When I was growing up, chickens weren’t something you studied, they were something you made silly jokes about". It has been eye-opening for me to learn what a difference they can make in the fight against poverty. It sounds funny, but I mean it when I say that I am excited about chickens.

TICK VACCINE FOR AFRICAN CATTLE .

Two Queensland scientists have been recruited as part of a global project to help develop a tick vaccine for the African cattle industry.The tick may be an enemy of the Australian beef industry, but the situation is even more dire in Africa.The research is part of a global project, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, to help the overseas cattle producers combat tick infestation. Researcher Alicja Lew-Tabor said ticks were having a significant impact on domestic beef production in Africa.Unlike Australian producers, African producers generally only supply their domestic market and Dr Lew-Tabor said ticks caused significant problems in meat and milk supply. "Most of the countries in Africa have cattle of sorts, whether it is for milk or beef production, and most of them would be in regions that are affected by cattle tick and the diseases that they carry," Dr Lew-Tabor said."Ticks are resistant to a lot of the drugs that they use to put on the cattle; they become resistant to them in time."That chemical resistance was the very reason why Dr Lew-Tabor and fellow researcher Manuel Rodriguez-Valle were selected to join the worldwide project. For five years, they have worked on the development of many vaccine strains which could have potential in Africa.They started with 300 possibilities and have selected 25 vaccines which could be successful in controlling the tick infestation.Dr Rodriguez-Valle said the work was tedious, but the results looked good."We have two candidates that look very interesting [and] we will have results very quickly, at the end of February; we are very confident in them," he said.To control the results, the cattle are kept isolated in pens.The goal is to try to reduce the number of ticks per animal by 70 per cent. We infect the animals with around 5,000 tick larvae and wait until the ticks drop off each animal, then we collect the tick, weigh it and analyse the reduction in the number of ticks," Dr Rodriguez-Valle said.The vaccines inject antigens into the cattle, creating antibodies to attack the ticks."We got 80 per cent protection in a trial that we did in Brazil but what they [Gates Foundation] has wanted us to do is pull that mixture apart and work out what the most active components are," Dr Lew-Tabor said.The vaccine is expected to be ready to use within five years, and Dr Lew-Tabor said there could be benefits for Australian beef producers too."They will be able to bring the more susceptible breeds into regions where they don't have those breeds," she said. source; ABC NEWS.