Dilemma in Building a Swiftlet House

Trading bird nest is a lucrative business. What about if you can own the source of bird nest namely owning a swiftlet house?

To own a swiftlet house, you can rent an unoccupied house, unoccupied shop lot or build one in the middle of the palm oil plantation for instance. Renting a space may be a cheaper option whereas building a swiftlet house say a double storey structure may cost you RM200,000.

The success rate is 3% - 20% which is rather low. Therefore whether or not to go ahead with building a swiftlet house is a major decision.

Some question that just for birds to stay, why you need to build such an expensive structure, a structure that if you put in interior finishes is the same as that for human habitation. The result of this doubt is that now some farmers use containers instead of the concrete structure. A container may cost you RM8000. You need to stack up the containers on top of a concrete supporting structure and to insulate the wall and ceiling of a container to achieve stable internal temperature.

It is known that a pair of swiftlets lay 2 eggs each time, 3 times per year. So ideally in one year the growth of population of swiftlets is 8 out of a pair. In some areas in Malaysia, the number of the swiftlet houses double semi-annually. How to lure enough number of swiftlets to stay in the new houses in order to break even your investmetn is a big question mark.

Think twice before you invest and make sure that you can have enough swiftlets to stay in your swiftlet house.

Posted by Chai Yong of Post a Comment