
The Pig sector is large and associated overwhelmingly with poor and disadvantaged groups. More than 90% of the 540,000 households involved in rearing pigs have either one or two pigs as ‘fatteners’, in simple, low-cost, low-input, small-scale systems. Pigs are reared mostly in rural areas, with women being central to pig-raising activities.
Rearing pigs help rural households have a safety net in terms of savings, nutritious food security and provide a source of cash for household expenditure.
Samarth-NMDP aims to improve the performance of the pig sector by facilitating the development of a sustainable pig breeding system, through the development of market agents at the village level, who can provide improved boars and artificial insemination services. Other interventions focus on facilitating a public-private dialogue to identify the challenges and issues facing the sector; and enhancing small farmers’ access to markets by strengthening trade through improved aggregation mechanisms, guaranteed buy-back agreements and hygienic small slaughterhouses.
Current Interventions
1. High Quality and Sustainable Pig Seed Stock
2. Enhanced Public Private Dialogue
3. Improved Pig and Pork Marketing
Samarth-NMDP is implementing this project in partnership with CEAPRED