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Friday, March 29, 2024

Inmates benefit from ZamPen chicken tech

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Zamboanga City—Inmates at the San Ramon Prison and Penal Colony here are benefitting to Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development’s ZamPen native chicken technology.

The project was started in 2016 and funded by PCAARRD in collaboration with Western Mindanao Agriculture and Aquatic Resources Research and Development Consortium and the Bureau of Corrections, according to Dr. Teresita Narvaez, Western Mindanao State University Vice President for Resource Generation who directs the consortium.

Narvaez said inmates raise the chickens native to the Zamboanga Peninsula—hence ZamPen—“science-based” and free-range.

Technologies and protocol were developed by WMSU on the management of the native chickens—from hatching, day-old, hardening, and up to the time the birds become ready for breeding. 

It also includes selecting and purifying the strain and developing the health protocol and feeding management system that are adopted in the project.

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Narvaez said PCAARRD provided funding for chicken strain purification in three regions, including Region 9, and the sustainability of ZamPen native chicken technology.

The WMSU College of Agriculture, she added, is only 20 hectares large, so the agreement with the penal colony provided the needed area for technology development. 

Inmates are close to Narvaez’s heart since her father was once incarcerated, she revealed.

The project provides a supply of ZamPen chickens to other farmer-cooperators who adopted the technology. 

Now, other farms supply businesses across the region.

Narvaez said the project offers inmates “productive reintegration to society” after serving their prison terms.

Freed inmates are being monitored for the continuous adoption of ZamPen native chicken technology, according to PCAARRD Applied Communication Division Director Marita Carlos.

“That is what we are promoting in PCAARRD, the transfer of technology,” Carlos said.

Dr. Synan Baguio, PCAARRD Livestock Research Divison OIC, pointed out that native chicken is tasty because of the concentration of free amino acids.

The consortium hosted a two-day Farmers Encounter through the Science and Technology Agenda (FIESTA) featuring ZamPen native chicken production last week.

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