Government assistance has contributed greatly to the success of Bua cattle farmer Kalyan Singh.
Mr Singh, who owns 234 acres of freehold land at Vunivau in Bua, revealed this to a media team on a tour of the Northern Division.
From a humble beggining of 10 cattle way back in 1985, Singh through sacrifices and hard work now boasts more than 100 cattle.
“I would like to thank the livestock officers from the Department of Agriculture for assisting me with quality advice on cattle farming, which really improved my production,” Mr Singh said.
Apart from beef farming, he is also into the dairy business with 16 milk-cows on his farm to be milked every morning.
“Although we do not have a dairy company to buy our milk direct from the farm, I managed to sell some to neighboring farmers and villagers, but most of the time we use the milk to produce ghee which I sell in Labasa,” Mr Singh said.
Ghee is sold at the Labasa market for $10 to $12 per 750ml bottle.
Having diversified into sheep farming and now with a stock of 90, he is regarded a pioneer sheep farmer of the province because he ventured into sheep farming back in 1983.
“I bought them off a European man, the sheep stock consisted mainly of New Zealand breed, but today I have also introduced the Fiji breed known as Fiji Fantastic,” said Mr Singh, who also supply goats to Viti Levu during festive seasons.
“Without government assistance my farm production could not have been boosted further.”
Mr Singh was assisted through the (ROI) Rural Outer Island program with the Department of Agriculture, from which he received $13,500 worth of assistance.
“I am so thankful to Government for enabling me to build a sheep shed, fencing materials and build a cattle stockyard through the ROI assistance," he said.
The Bua farmer is also awating his submission to the Northern Development Program, where he hopes to receive $16,000 to raise the levels of his cattle, sheep and goat farming methods.
Kalyan Singh seen here on his cattle farm