It has just gone 6:00 am in a small, rural town with a laid-back atmosphere. The air is cool and filled with the sounds of nature. Khanyisile Maseko from Elukwatini in Mpumalanga makes her way around her backyard to check on her chickens.
She carefully opens the door to her coop and breathes a sigh of relief. Thank goodness. Her feathered friends are still alive.
“Every morning, I walk to the chicken coop with a bit of fear in my heart,” she tells Food For Mzansi. “I know that sometimes chicks die. [My fear is] due to the previous experiences [I had] and sometimes diseases, but I’ve since tried to find a way to eliminate the mortality rate.”
Once Maseko has confirmed that all her chickens are alive, her day’s work can begin. She starts by conducting a quick health check, examining their breathing and eyes. If she’s satisfied, Maseko starts cleaning and refilling their water containers and feeders.
“There are days when we’ll need to change the sawdust if it’s gotten wet. Keeping the coop dry and clean is essential for the chickens’ health and comfort,” she shares.
Between a rock and a hard place
For over a decade, Maseko, known as ‘Khanyi da Stud’ in the entertainment industry, was a full-time DJ, rubbing elbows with big-time celebs.
At some, point she also had a content producer gig at Soweto TV’s Sistahood show and freelanced as an independent contractor for an online radio station based in Randburg. She also owned a digital magazine that focused on the entertainment industry.
However, when Covid struck, events to perform became scarce. Everything she had built came tumbling down.
“It was a very uncertain time in my life, and I didn’t know what my next step would be,” she tells Food For Mzansi. “I felt lost, to be honest.”
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During this time of uncertainty, she turned to a farmer friend, Lebohang Dhludhlu, for mentorship. It wasn’t long before Maseko took a chance and invested R10 000 from her savings into buying feeders, drinkers, sawdust, brooder lights, medication, and 50 day-old Ross 308 chickens.
“With my savings running low and no gigs on the horizon, I knew I needed to think outside the box on how to sustain myself.
“Initially, I started my farming business in my garage, and then after six months of operating from there, I saved enough money to build a structure.”
Maseko caters to her clients’ needs, offering them a variety of options from live chickens, to slaughtered, or packaged chickens. Her customer base primarily consists of individuals from Elukwatini, with some local businesses, such as chisanyama’s, also purchasing from her for resale.
Since starting in 2022 with only 50 chicks, she has expanded her flock tenfold, demonstrating the rapid growth of her business. “Now I go up to 600 because I put 300 per cycle.”
Costs of running a chicken business
Maseko was shocked by how expensive chicken feed, electricity, and medication were. This made her rethink how much to charge for her chicken meat, she explains.
“I started selling at R90 and now it’s R120. Soon, I’m gonna be charging R130.”
To deal with load shedding and high electricity costs, she bought a coal stove, which saved her money and worked better than her previous method.
“The brooder lights in the coop are switched off during the day when there’s natural light but if the weather is particularly cold, we keep them on to keep the chickens warm.
“So, the length of time the lights stay on really depends on the temperature outside,” she explains.
A game plan for the future
Maseko is currently looking into making her own chicken feed. She’s even considering expanding into crops as she does not want to limit herself.
She has big plans for the brand, envisioning a line of chicken-based products like biltong that she can sell in supermarkets across the country.
“Looking back, I realise the pandemic gave me an opportunity to reassess my life.”
Her advice to others is not to be afraid to leap into the unknown.
“You know where you want to go and what you want to achieve… Embrace the journey, even if it’s tough, and if you fail along the way, at least you gave it your best shot,” Maseko says.
In the meantime, she still makes time to DJ and hopes to one day reopen her entertainment magazine.
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