NALOA prepares ahead of 2025 Tobaski Ram Sales

Ebrima O. Jallow, who was speaking in a recent interview with The Point, maintained that right now they’ve put a lot of measures in place to ensure that people have livestock in the country.

He further acknowledged that as always, the case in the country, the demand for livestock especially during Eid is too high.

"We all know that in The Gambia, the demand for animals is too high and in view of that we always find it difficult to meet this growing demand. So, meaning, we have to go outside to source these animals to supply the demands of the Gambians."

Jallow noted that in the past, his organization has conducted series of meetings with key stakeholders and is also working closely with The Gambia Livestock Marketing Agency (GLMA) in preparing the ground ahead of the 2025 Livestock show.

"The reason why we had this meeting with stakeholder’s is to make sure we have rams available to Gambians. If you look, in the Gambia, we don't have enough animals as most of the animals being sold here are coming from Senegal, Niger and Mali "

To this end, Jallow observed that the withdrawal of Sahelian countries from the ECOWAS regional bloc has also affected the smooth importation of livestock into the country, as these countries are major exporters of animals.

The withdrawal of these countries from ECOWAS regional bloc, he said, might have some obstacles as these countries might not respect the ECOWAS protocol of free movement of goods and services.

Based that, he said, he cannot guarantee the public that the price of ram is going to go down, noting that this is even the reason why they informed the government earlier that farmers cannot do all that protocols.

"We may expect the price of animals to go up but we are trying to work to make sure we have accessibility of these animals into the country."

NALOA president recalled that at this time last year, CFA stands at D400 plus and that this year as ‘we speak’ the CFA is currently pegged at GMD600, which will no doubt affects the price of livestock dealers in importing animals into The Gambia.

This, he observed, will negatively impact on the price of livestock, considering the transportation cost, payment at the borders and feeds just to name, a few.

NALOA prexy maintained that he cannot determine or assured the public that the price of the animals will go down due to the stated factors.

However, he stated that his organization has undertaken series of activities in the past and that last year with the support of GTUCCU involved in livestock business.

He said that this year again they’ve GMD10 million to support the dealers or those involved in the livestock.