SAINT KITTS AND NEVIS

Geograophy
Saint Kitts and Nevis, officially the Federation of Saint Christopher and Nevis (or the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis) is located in the Leeward Islands and is a unitary island nation in the Caribbean and the smallest nation in the Americas in both area and population. The geographic coordinates  are 17° 20' N, 62° 45' W. The capital city and government for the federated state is Basseterre situated on the larger island of Saint Kitts (formerly named Saint Christopher). The smaller state of Nevis lies about 3 km southeast of Saint Kitts.
To the north-northwest lie the islands of Saint Eustatius, Saba, Saint Barthélemy, and Saint Martin. To the northeast are Antigua and Barbuda, and to the south-east is Montserrat. The land area  of  St. Kitts is 168 sq. km., and that of Nevis 93 sq. km. The combined population is 38,000 with an annual population growth rate of 0.623%.The capital city Basseterre has a population of about 15,000.
The terrain is generally mountainous with the highest elevations of 1,156 m. on St. Kitts and 985 m. on Nevis. The climate is tropical.

The Poultry Industry
The poultry population of St Kitts and Nevis consists mainly of layer burds as most of the broiler farms went out of operation in the past ten years. For special occasions (such as Christmas) a few farmers import day old chicks from Barbados to meet the seasonal rise in local demand for poultry meat.  There are a total of 8 layer farms with between 2000 and 10,000 birds in lay and several small back yard farms with between 25 to 100 birds in lay.  In 2003, table egg production totaled 3.6 million eggs resulting in a per capita table egg consumption of approximately 80 eggs. Per capita poultry meat consumption was estimated at 53 kg in that same year.
There are approximately 5 back yard broiler farms providing broiler meat for the local population. Almost all the poultry meat consumed is imported from the USA as frozen poultry meat. There are no processing plants or hatcheries on the islands.
Day-old chicks are imported from hatcheries in Barbados and the USA. The imported day-old chicks are vaccinated in the hatchery prior to export against Newcastle Disease. Other vaccines used in the industry are vaccines against Gumboro Disease, Marek’s Disease and Salmonellosis.
Over the past five years, there have been no outbreaks of diseases in the poultry population.
The St Kitts and Nevis Animal Movement and Disease Prevention Act regulates the movement of animals including poultry and stipulates the measures to be taken to prevent and control animal diseases.
The Ministry of Agriculture employs two veterinarians and one animal health assistant in St Kitts and one veterinarian and two animal health assistants in Nevis.  At present there is no Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory but the Official Veterinary Services collaborate with the Laboratory at the Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine (an American off-shore Veterinary College) in the areas of animal disease diagnostics and surveillance.