by Vanessa Braithwaite 
IN WHAT HAS been deemed a highly successful venture, the agriculture department of the Kwakwani Secondary School has beaten all odds to produce cooking gas from pig manure. The project which commenced a year ago, had been initiated by Mr. Howard London, an agronomist attached to the United Nations Developmental Programme and has seen the production of sufficient gas to supply the Home Economics Department for the cooking of meals. The UNDP collaborated with the Ministry of Agriculture, which funded the project and supplied the school with six pigs to begin the exercise. To date, those pigs have multiplied to 10 and have bred twice. Unfortunately however, the second set of piglets was born blind and while some were squeezed to death, the others grew and died afterward.
Agriculture teacher Leon Conway told the Guyana Chronicle that the piglets were born with a genetic condition, hence the reason for their blindness. “They had to be led by the others to drink water because they couldn’t see and the vet told us maybe the pigs were bred too young, which may be the reason for this condition. Currently, the department is sourcing a new method to breed the pigs, so as to ascertain whether there will be a recurrence of pigs being born blind,” he said.
Technical Problems
The project is currently at a standstill after it was revealed that the gas was escaping from the tank. An energy-saving company recently visited the school to ascertain what was causing this mishap and the team discovered the top of the tank leaking. Repair work is currently being done on the tank to have the gas secured. Mr. Conway averaged that by next week, the project should be up and running. The manure is currently used for gardening.
Student involvement
Parents and students have expressed tremendous excitement about the project and are integrally involved in the day-to-day caring of the pigs. In the initial stages they were involved in constructing the pens and feeding system.
“We have allowed students from Forms 3 to 5 to be involved in this project, but primarily Forms 3 and 4 as the Fifth Formers had taken [time] off to prepare for CXC,” he said. The First and Second Formers are carried to the pens when given lessons on swine, while the Fifth Formers go only when completing their practical.
The teachers and students are time-tabled to look after the pigs on week days, while Mr. Conway takes over that responsibility on weekends. Regional Education Officer of Region 10 Marcia Andrews has expressed optimism about the project and posited that once it takes off and production increases, the initiative will move to dormitory schools so as to cut the cost of purchasing cooking gas.