A pig farmer, Mr Fortune Alabi, says benefits of pigs value chain are numerous and called for research to tap into them for national development.
According to him, a pig’s skin can be used to treat severe burn.
Alabi said that Nigeria had yet to explore many of the benefits of pig farming.
The farmer, who outlined a wide range of products derived from pig value chain, said that Nigeria should fully exploit the potential of pig farming.
“There are so many value chains for pig meat, but in Nigeria we mainly utilise pork meat for consumption,” he told NAN.
He added in an interview with NAN that many pharmaceutical companies in developed countries used pig meat to produce drugs.
“We are way behind in exploring the limitless value chain of pigs, unlike the advanced world; the oinks of the pig are not used for anything.
“We have not even started to scratch the surface of the value chain; that is why production of pigs abroad is a big business.
“We need to tap into this limitless value chain of pig farming; we should start playing big in the pharmaceutical world,” he said.
Alabi called on governments to invest in research on pig value chain to increase the lucrativeness of the business.
“When you go to India for medical tourism, when a patient has severe burn, the skin of pigs is used to treat it.
“We really do not conduct research on these aspects of pigs in our country; we are still tied down to religion and environmental factors when it comes to pig meat.
“Our government needs to put in more efforts in research, bring research partners to explore the value chain of pig farming, so we can learn from them.
“We have research institute, we should go into this properly, so we can start producing different items with different parts of pig.
“If we do all these, we will not even have pigs for consumption. Farmers will rather sell them for pharmaceutical uses and make more money,” he said.
