AFRICABIZ VOL 2 - ISSUE: 109
May 15 - June 14, 2008
Previous Issue
Editor: Dr. Bienvenu-Magloire Quenum
Click here for contact & support console

Featured Article Countries Briefs Live News On Africa Support Africabiz Online

Contact Information Synopsis Rss Feed Sample A Word From the Editor Business Opportunities

FrontDoor Your Feedback Freebie For You Control Your Desktop

A WORD FROM THE EDITOR

Dear visitor and international investor,

We warmly welcome you, if this is your first visit to Africabiz Online - The ultimate newsletter on trading and investing in 49 sub-Saharan African countries. If you are a regular and faithful reader, welcome back.

- PASSION IS THE DRIVING FORCE TO SUCCESSFUL ENTREPRENEURSHIP

We had worked hard during past 60 days to revamp the website dedicated to jobs and entrepreneurship. That is the meeting place for jobs seekers and entrepreneurs - worldwide. We moved the coding from CGI to PHP in order to speedup the website loading and other processes. Now as you can see clicking on above link, the interface has been streamlined. It is user-friendly and more appealing. There is a concise How it Works page and detailed Frequently Asked Questions pages for Entrepreneurs and Jobs-seekers/ Experts.

Whatever is your line of expertise, wherever you live in: the USA, the Americas, in Asia, in Africa, in Australia, in the Middle-East, the Far-East, or in Europe, you can login and post your CV and review jobs and projects loaded by entrepreneurs from the world at large - as far as you speak and write English. (Sorry for other languages, we cannot afford having site monitors who are "experts" in all languages of the world!). Go ahead, login and become a member of the freelancers community worldwide.

One day or another, sooner or latter, sooner than you think it possible you will win bids about projects/ jobs, and or even find a permanent job in your city, region or country. Signup is free.

As you may have noticed visiting Africabiz Online, we are a dedicated team, working with passion to promote entrepreneurship in and out African countries. We are believers in what we do. We are simply said passionate people. That is what is driving us. Passion.

You can "load" your staff with people who are highly graduated in their line of expertise. They may have MBA, PhD with cum laude and so on. If they are not passionate people, who have passion about their jobs, you may not have a dynamic team. If they wake up in the morning worrying about going to work, they would be tired before starting the day, and you (your company) would be certainly meeting troubles half way. One way or another.

You as the team-leader does not spend to much time motivating passionate people because they are already motivated and enthusiastic people. Passionate people think about innovation all the time. They hate routine. They are creators who are always in search for the best solution to solve problems and overcome hindrances. They are never bored doing what they are doing. They are dedicated people, who always want the job done and done efficiently.

You are a blessed entrepreneur when you have passionate people in your staff, and you should do whatever it takes to keep such people working for you (your company). You should provide good working environment, and efficient office equipment, and most of all give them incentives of all kinds.

We invite you to read about Passion and putting the right people at the right place, the recipe to successful entrepreneurship in any line of business. Click here to read about: "The Right People" by guest author William Frank Diedrich

- SERVICES AND PRODUCTS FROM Dr. QUENUM & ASSOCIATES / BUSINESSAFRICA (TM)

List of Products and Solutions to trading and investing in and out emerging nations - and particularly in sub-Saharan African nations - is here to review.

We draw your attention to Jobs & Projects' platform that assists first, project-owners to tender for the best experts to carry out projects at very competitive costs, and, second, job-seekers to publish for free R�sum�s/CV to attract project-owners attention.

The Free and Pay-Per-Click advertisement platform is also the cheapest way to advertise for your business and drive traffic to your website.

Dr. Quenum and Associates, IBC / BusinessAfrica (TM) have decided to follow Yahoo wise business practice - that is to establish business relationship only with clients who can produce email address linked to an ISP domain name or that could be traced back against a database of valid and legitimate domain names. In other words, from now on, only ISP-based email messages can expect replies from Dr. Quenum & Associates, IBC / BusinessAfrica (TM). For more on the matter, please visit this link.

- Contributor's Guidelines are here to review. Your contribution on "How emerging nations and particularly African countries / entrepreneurs could bridge the developing gap" is welcome.

Your feedback / objection / contribution is welcome. Visit WorldWide BizCenter, and choose General Information (as topic) to create a thread for discussion. On the top of the WorldWide BizCenter page, there is a HELP link to assist you making an efficient use of the discussion board. This link also is useful

Many thanks for dropping by and see you here on June 15, 2008

Dr. B.M. Quenum
Editor of AFRICABIZ

BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES IN AFRICA

- Several business opportunities - component parts of the Integrated Developing Scheme described in Africans, Stop Being Poor! are listed in following table.

1-SHEA BUTTER (5, 6, 7, 11, 12, 13) 2- BLUE GOLD (14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19) 3- FREEZE-DRIED PAPAIN (20, 21, 22 and here) 4- KENAF (23, 24) 5- VEGETABLE OIL (25, 26, 27, 28) 6- CEREALS (30, 31, 32, 33) 7- FRUITS (34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46) 8- ESSENTIAL OILS (47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52)	9- ROOTS & TUBERS (54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64) 10- FOWL BREEDING (66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76) 11- FISH FARMING (78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87) 12- BIOMASS ENERGY (89, 90, 91, 92) 13- SUGAR CANE & PRODUCTS (93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99/100, 101, 102) 14- LIVESTOCK (103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110,

- LIVESTOCK & GAME DEVELOPMENT: PART VI - A MEDIUM-SCALE CATTLE FATTENING OPERATION - D - BIOGAS VOLUME PRODUCED FROM CATTLE DUNG

This delivery is a continuation to the previous ones [104, 105, 106, 107] that laid down the basics to the economics to a medium-scale operation to fattening 100 cattle heads per month as here explained

One of the few nectars of this world is water, another is milk and the third one is cattle dung. With onset of what we call "modern civilization", we have been despising a few things and one of these is cattle dung. [Source: by Shri Venishankar M. Vasu]

We agree with M. Vasu and add that dung in general, human waste included are invaluable raw materials for agricultural development. Dung is an invaluable raw material that can be used as fertilizer and also to generate power. China and other Asian countries are using dung to fertilize land since ages. And modern China and India had developed biogas production technology based on the utilization of dung.

That is not the case in African countries except in the sun-drenched Sahelian region where sun-dried animal dung is used as cooking fuel, and in central African Lakes region, particularly in Rwanda where dung utilization to producing biogas is promoted since five years.

Here in this delivery, in continuation to the previous one that described the fattening of 1,200 cattle heads per year, a brief description is exposed about biogas production in African rural areas, using cattle dung as raw material.

- QUANTITY OF DUNG PROCUCED BY A CATTLE HEAD

The quantity of dung produced by animals depends on the daily intake of forage, water and additional feeding, the age of the animal and of course the component parts of the feeding. That is reduced protein intake means less waste produced by cattle, swine and horses. Indeed, in Northern developed countries, environmental concerns led to research to reduce the quantity of Nitrogen released by animals.

In India, in tropical environment, an adult cattle (+3 years old) gives on average 4 tonnes of dung and 1,516 tonnes of urine per year - according to M. Vasu as per source above linked; and also as per the comprehensive study about biogas system in India available at this link. That is around 10 kg of dung per day plus 4.5 kg of urine per day - per cattle head.

Above exposed quantity of dung and urine released by a cattle head is staggering but represents an asset if used to fertilize land and or to generate power.

- RAW DUNG VERSUS THE EFFLUENT PRODUCED BY A BIODISTER

Fresh raw cattle dung is an excellent organic fertilizer. Its utilization would save a country hard currency necessary to importing chemical fertilizers or establishing capital intensive plants to producing chemical fertilizers.

However, due to the fact that the effluent resulting from the transformation of dung into biogas is less pathogenic and more efficient (as fertilizer) than fresh dung, it would be better to transform dung into biogas and use the effluent as fertilizer.

Indeed, the nitrogen in the slurry (effluent) has been mineralized, meaning that it has taken the form of NH4+ (basic), rather than NO32- and nitrite (acidic), which are common forms in cow dung. The NH4+ is more readily absorbed by the plants, and, because of its positive charge, it binds to the soil colloids in the ground, likely lowering the nitrogen leakage compared with cow dung. [Source]

Humus improves the quality of the soil, by increasing soil porosity and water-holding properties. The residue also supports the microbiological activity in the ground, which helps keep the crops healthier and more resistant to different kinds of pest, thus lowering the demand for chemical pesticides, compared with chemical fertilizer. As shown by a scientific study here available.

Table I below gives the nutrient contents of various kinds of raw manures - as per Mr. Vasu. Figures listed in the table show that these manures can be used as fertilizers and reduce the utilization of "artificial" fertilizers.

And Table II compares nutrients content of raw dung (from goats and rabbits) and effluent released by a biodigester. [Source]

Comparing figures about nutrient contents listed in both tables, one sees that effluent is more efficient as fertilizer than raw dung.

Table I - Average Nutrient Contents of Manures
Type of Manures	% Nitrogen (N)	% Phosphoric acid (P2O5)	% Potash
Cow/buffalo dung	0.3 -0.4	0.1 -0.2	0.1 -0.3
Horse dung	0.4 -0.5	0.3 -0.4	0.3 -0.4
Sheep/goat dung	0.5 -0.7	0.4 -0.6	0.3 -1.0
Cow/buffalo urine	0.9 -1.2	NIL	0.5 -1.0
Horse urine	1.2 -1.5	NIL	1.3 -1.5
Sheep/goat urine	1.5 -1.7	NIL	1.8 -2.0
Dry compost manure	0.7 -2.0	0.9 -3. 0	1.0 -2. 0
Waste from stable cows/buffalos or horses	0.4 -1.5	0.3 -0.9	0.6 -1.9
Source: "Handbook of Agriculture" (1987) pp. 215, Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR)

Table II - The Composition of Biodigester Effluent and Raw Manure Nutrients  N P K Biodigester effluent, mg/liter 375 31.8 61.6 Raw manure, g/kg 1.34 1.99 0.68

- ESTIMATE OF BIOGAS VOLUME GENERATED BY A CATTLE FATTENING BUSINESS

Previous deliveries [89, 90, 91, 92] have already discussed the matter considering hog fattening. Following paragraphs consider cattle fattening operation as per previous issue. That is an operation that at capacity fattens 1,200 cattle heads a year.

Based on figures available above, the quantity of dung available per year would be in average: 4,000MT or [1,200 cattle heads*10kg*365days]; and the quantity of urine would be in average every year: 1,900MT or[1,200 cattle heads* 4.5kg*365 days]

Which means that the slurry that could be ingested in the biodigester would be amounting to 6,000MT of global waste (raw dung plus urine).

According to pigsite.com and as reported in previous issue 92, an operation to fattening hog can produce 720m3 of biogas per pig and per day.

Then, even if pig dung and raw cattle dung do not have the same nutrients composition, the fact that cattle urine would be blended to cattle raw dung and injected into the biodigester, one can take the amount of 720 m3 of biogas produced by a pig per day as working hypothesis and evaluate the amount of biogas produced by one operation that fattens 1,200 cattle heads per year to be equals to: 313,360,000 m3 of biogas per year or [720m3*1200 cattle heads*365days]

- SOME BIOGAS APPLICATIONS

Volume of biogas reported above is a staggering amount of biogas for only one operation that fattens 1,200 cattle heads per year.   Graphic below (courtesy of this source) gives an idea about some applications of biogas energy.

 
Next issue 110 (to be delivered on June 15, 2008) will briefly expose quantity of electricity a network of medium-scale cattle fattening operations can produce. 

MORE ON LIVESTOCK & GAME DEVELOPMENT

1-Handbook of Livestock Management by Richard A. Battaglia (Paperback - Jul 21, 2006) 2- Raising Small Livestock: A Practical Handbook by Jerome D. Belanger (Paperback - Feb 11, 2005) 3- The Homesteader's Handbook to Raising Small Livestock Goats, Chickens, Sheep. Geese, Rabbitts, Hogs, Turkeys, Guinea Fowl, Ducks and Pigeons by Jerome D. Belanger (Hardcover - April 1974) 4- Backyard Livestock: Raising Good, Natural Food for Your Family, Third Edition by Steven Thomas and George P. Looby (Paperback - Jan 2, 2007) 5- Keeping Livestock Healthy: A Veterinary Guide to Horses, Cattle, Pigs, Goats & Sheep, 4th Edition by N. Bruce Haynes (Paperback - Nov 1, 2001) 6- Alternative Health Practices for Livestock by Michael Keilty and Thomas Morris (Hardcover - Jan 1, 2006)

7- A World Dictionary of Livestock Breed Types, and Varieties by V. Porter and I. L. Mason (Hardcover - Jun 6, 2002) 8- Livestock waste facilities handbook (Paperback - 1985) 9- Raising Small Livestock: A Practical Handbook by Jerome D. Belanger (Paperback - Feb 11, 2005) 10- Livestock Feeds and Feeding (5th Edition) (Hardcover - Jun 8, 2001) by Richard O. Kellems and David C. Church 11- Raising Game Birds by Lessiter Publications (Paperback - Jun 1986) 12- Livestock Production in Unfavourable Economic Environments: Strategies for Attaining Sustained Competitive Advantage by P. G. A Jennings (Hardcover - Mar 30, 2007)

Interested parties - private African and international investors / companies, government agencies, international development agencies - to make contact through the Free Access Support Console available at this link

Contact through the support console will get quickest reply from Africabiz Online's staff, than contact by emails. Click here for contact information. Be advised that first contact should be through the support console to be followed by phone calls. If you are a VIP-Member, use VIP-Members Support Console available here. Before you consult please click here to review this clarification

COUNTRIES BRIEFS