Establishment and Rehabilitation of a Meat Marketing Centre

Establishment and Rehabilitation of a Meat Marketing Centre in Khan Younis

A centre equipped to preserve and market meat according to quality standards and value chain principles

A livestock keeper can have a good flock, sufficient feed, and veterinary services protecting it, and still earn a limited return. The link that actually determines the value of livestock production is the last one: how the product reaches the market, at what quality, and at what price. A producer selling under poor marketing conditions loses a substantial share of the value they created, however well they raised the animals.

Working from that understanding, SAFE turned to the final link in the value chain, establishing and rehabilitating a meat marketing centre in Khan Younis Governorate in May 2005, at a total cost of USD 15,000 over three months.

The Project in Numbers

• One marketing centre established, rehabilitated, and equipped
• The most advanced available methods and equipment for meat preservation and quality assurance
• Three months of implementation
• USD 15,000 total cost of establishment, rehabilitation, and equipping

Why a Marketing Centre?

Because the gap in the livestock sector was never in production alone, but in everything that follows it:

Preserving quality — Meat is highly perishable, and any break in the cold chain between slaughter and sale means deteriorating quality and lost value, and at times food safety risks. Equipping a centre with modern preservation facilities protects the product and, with it, consumer confidence.

Improving producer returns — An organised marketing channel reduces the producer's dependence on intermediaries who capture a large margin, and strengthens their bargaining position on price.

Developing the value chain — not as terminology but as a working method: linking production, processing, storage, and marketing into a single system so that added value is retained within the local community rather than leaking out of it.

SAFE's Role

SAFE led the project drawing on its agricultural and technical expertise: assessing marketing needs in the governorate's livestock sector, defining the centre's specifications and rehabilitation requirements, identifying the facilities and equipment needed for quality assurance, supervising construction, rehabilitation, and installation works, and overseeing commissioning.

Partnership for a Productive Sector

The project reflects an important dimension of SAFE's approach: agricultural development is not complete at production, but when the product reaches the market at a quality that preserves its value and a return that preserves the producer's share of it.

Raising well is one thing; selling well is another. The first project builds the flock; the second builds the income.