LUDHIANA: Guru Angad Dev Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Ludhiana conferred Chief Minister awards to three livestock farmers on the 13th of September 2024. These awards were conferred in an impressive function by S. Gurmeet Singh Khuddian, Cabinet Minister, Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Dairy Development and Food Processing in the Vet Varsity Mela Ground. Dr. Parkash Singh Brar, Director of Extension Education said that Vet Varsity is making all out efforts for the development of the livestock sector in the state by strengthening its extension programmes.
In order to motivate various categories of livestock farmers, the university organizes innovative competitions by assessing the extent and impact of adoption of these technologies in improving the productivity and profitability of different livestock farming systems.
He revealed that In the Cattle Farming category, S. Harpreet Singh s/o S. Lakhbir Singh, VPO Sohal, District Tarntaran got the award. He has 145 cows and the daily milk production at his farm is 12.5 quintals. He had established a modern milking parlor and an ultra-modern shed. He has tagged all his animals and uses all modern Artificial Intelligence techniques to record every activity of the animals. He has an automatic scraper for dairy waste management. He has well maintained silo pits for silage making and uses Total Mixed Ration machine to mix silage and concentrate for feeding.
In the Poultry Farming category, Gurdarshan Singh Tiwana s/o S Malkeet Singh, village Chanarthal Khurd, District Fatehgarh Sahib earned the award. He started broiler farming in 2004 and established environment controlled, tunnel ventilated sheds in 2017. Now he rears 60, 000 broilers per batch (6 batches per year) thereby producing over 3, 50, 000 broilers per annum. He gets his feed customized according to the age of the birds in crumb form to improve the feed conversion ratio. He has an automatic feeding and watering system in the farm. He takes care of the biosecurity system with well-established protocols for reducing the incidence of diseases.
In the category of Value Addition of Livestock Produce, Sh. Kuljas Rai Arora s/o Sh Mohan Lal of village Wadala Viram, Tehsil Majitha, District Amritsar achieved the award. He started from a layer farm having 1000 birds in 1975, shifted to broiler farming in 1992 and increased broiler birds’ capacity to 30, 000 per batch. In 2010, he then ventured into hatchery business with own parent stock to produce 500, 000 birds per month. In 2017 he shifted gears and established a high-tech processing unit under his brand ‘Rai Chicken’. At present he is marketing 618 ton dressed meat and 49 ton ready to eat products (sausages, nuggets, seekh kabab etc.) per month with a force of 245 employees in a state of art processing unit.
These awards carry a plaque, shawl and citation along with cash money.