Each broiler eats about 4.2 kg of feed between the day it hatches and the day it leaves for market. Multiply that by a thousand birds and you are buying roughly four and a fifth tonnes of feed, or about 84 bags of 50 kg, before a single bird has been sold.
Feed deserves more attention than it usually gets. It is the largest cost in the ledger, it is paid for in advance, and it is the line you can measure every single day.
What the bags cost
Two price points matter here. Members of GAPFA buy broiler starter at GH₵400 to GH₵410 per 50 kg bag. The De Heus list price runs from GH₵451 to GH₵472. The table takes both ends of each range through the same bird and the same batch.
| Bag price (GH₵ per 50 kg) | Per kg (GH₵) | Per bird, 4.2 kg (GH₵) | 1,000 birds, 84 bags (GH₵) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 400 (GAPFA member, low) | 8.00 | 33.60 | 33,600 |
| 410 (GAPFA member, high) | 8.20 | 34.44 | 34,440 |
| 451 (De Heus list, low) | 9.02 | 37.88 | 37,884 |
| 472 (De Heus list, high) | 9.44 | 39.65 | 39,648 |
The gap between the cheapest and the dearest rows is about GH₵6,000 per 1,000-bird batch. That difference does not tell you which feed performs better in your house. It tells you what each route costs, and that is a number you can plan around.
Feed is more than half the batch
Put feed beside the rest of the ledger and the share is clear. Against the chick and about GH₵12 per bird of other costs, feed makes up 51 to 52 per cent of the placed cost on the GAPFA route. On list-price feed it climbs to 54 to 55 per cent. That is the basis for saying feed is more than half the investment.
Feed also carries a quieter cost that most plans miss. A bird that dies after week three has eaten a good share of its feed, and the bag count does not care whether the bird survived. At 5 per cent mortality, the feed cost per bird sold rises from about GH₵34 to about GH₵36. That extra couple of cedi is the price of the birds you lost.
This share is one reason the first plan so often looks cheaper than the final ledger. When feed is estimated low, the whole batch looks more profitable than it is, and the correction arrives mid-batch, when the next bags have to be bought.
When mortality pushes feed up
Feed per bird sold is the number that matters once losses arrive. At 10 per cent mortality, the GAPFA route at GH₵34.44 per bird placed becomes about GH₵38 per bird sold, and the De Heus list route at GH₵37.88 becomes about GH₵42. At 20 per cent the same two routes come to roughly GH₵43 and GH₵47.
Those figures are the feed bill spread over the birds that survive. They show why the feed line and the mortality line cannot be planned separately. A cheaper bag does little to protect a batch that loses a fifth of its birds, and keeping birds alive does more to protect the feed line than a change of supplier.
Feed conversion in plain terms
Feed conversion sounds technical, but the idea is simple. A broiler that eats 4.2 kg of feed and reaches 2.3 to 2.55 kg live has converted roughly 1.65 to 1.83 kg of feed into each kilo of live bird. The lower that figure, the less feed you pay for every kilo you sell.
The number moves when feed is wasted in the trough, when birds stay in the house longer than planned, or when the house is too hot or too cold for the birds to eat steadily. Track it weekly against the bags used and the birds still alive. A gap that opens between those two counts is the earliest warning you will get.
Model feed at both price points
Run the feed line at the GAPFA price and again at the De Heus list price using the calculator on the partner page. If a batch only works on the cheaper route, you have learned something important about how much room the plan really has.
Feed is also where a plan's arithmetic gets tested first. The bag count either matches the birds and the weight or it does not, and a mismatch shows up long before the sale.
Buying feed without guessing
Before placement, work out the bag count for the batch size you plan. For 1,000 birds at 4.2 kg each, that is 84 bags of 50 kg, before any allowance for spillage or for birds that die. Add a margin you can defend. A house that turns five or six batches a year buys feed that many times, so one careless estimate repeats across the year.
Then decide the route. The GAPFA member price is the cheaper line in the table above, and the De Heus list price is the dearer one. Whichever you use, ask for the bag price in writing and check the receipt against it. A price that drifts between the plan and the till is a cost you can only see if the original number was written down.
Feed also changes through the cycle. Broiler starter is the stage named in the figures here, and most programmes move to a different feed as the birds grow. Ask the farm how the stages are split and when each one changes, so your bag count matches the feed actually going into the trough.
Reading feed in the weekly report
Feed is the easiest line to check in a weekly report. If the bags used go up while the birds alive go down, the batch is consuming feed it is not turning into sellable weight. If the bags used stay flat while the weight should be climbing, check whether the birds are eating at all. Neither pattern proves anything on its own, but both point to a question that needs answering that week, not at the end of the cycle.
Storage, counting and the bags on the floor
Feed is cheap to lose. A bag left on damp concrete takes on moisture, and mouldy feed is not something you can sell your way out of. Keep bags off the floor, out of the rain, and rotate stock so the oldest goes first. Keep a simple running count of bags received, bags used and bags left, updated every day.
The count is also your audit. If the bags used in a week do not match the birds alive and the weight gain you recorded, one of those numbers is wrong. Partners reading weekly reports should see that count, not only a closing total.
Unused bags deserve their own line. A bag bought for a batch that finishes early is cash sitting in the store, and holding it too long in damp conditions turns it into a loss. Buy to the count plus a defensible allowance, not to a large margin that becomes stock.
An open feed price leaves the largest cost open
Feed prices change with the market, and an agreement that does not say how they are handled leaves the largest cost unsettled. Before you pay, ask in writing which feed brand is used, what bag price the batch assumes, and whether that price is fixed for the batch or reviewed. A vague answer on feed is a real warning sign.
Agro Prime's store sells feed, equipment and vaccines, so the prices in this article can be checked against what a buyer would actually pay at the counter. You can browse the store directly. If cash for feed is the sticking point, the poultry loans and grants guide sets out the funding routes people usually look at first.
Buying feed across the cycle
Feed purchases follow placement. The first bags are needed the day the chicks arrive, the later bags follow the flock's growth, and the last ones are counted down towards the sale. Buying the whole batch's feed at the start locks in cash early. Buying in stages keeps cash free but leaves you exposed to whatever the price is in the weeks ahead. Neither approach suits every investor, but the choice should be made on purpose and written into the plan.
A simple weekly check keeps that choice honest. Each week, write down the bags opened, the birds alive, the average weight the farm reports and the cedis spent on feed. Divide the bags used by the birds alive to see how much feed each bird has taken on, then compare that figure with the plan. You do not need a spreadsheet for this, though one helps. A notebook kept honestly does the same job.
What the agreement should say about feed
A feed clause is short to write and expensive to leave out. It should name the brand and the feeding stages, state the bag price the batch assumes, and say whether that price is fixed or reviewed during the cycle. It should also say how feed bags are counted and reported, so that the partner can check the bags used against the birds alive and the weight recorded each week.
Ask what happens to any unused bags at the end of the batch. Feed left in the store is still feed you paid for, and an agreement that is silent on it leaves a small but real question open at payout. Clear answers on those points are a sign the farm has thought the feed line through.
The bag prices in this article reflect the reference figures we work from, and they will move. Use them to build the model, then replace them with the price on the receipt for the bags you are actually offered.
Treat feed as the line you manage daily
The feed bill is not something you settle once. It is a daily set of decisions about bags, storage, waste and the counts that show whether the birds are eating the way they should. Get that right and the largest cost in the ledger becomes the one you control most closely.
Work out the bag count for your batch size, decide which price route you will use, and get the terms in writing before placement.
See how the batch handles feed
For the cash timing that comes with a feed bill, read the poultry cash flow and break-even guide.
