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Chicken and egg: A question of survival for poultry farmers
View(s):By Chrishanthi Christopher
A drop in chicken meat and egg sales due to unaffordable prices has seen poultry farmers issuing SOS calls for immediate Government intervention to bring down the cost of production.
They are urging the authorities to take swift action to stem the tide of rising chicken-feed and transport costs before the industry collapses.
Unable to cope with the shortage of chicken feed and high transport costs following the fuel crisis, around 50 percent of small and medium-scale businesses had left the industry, according to the All-Island Poultry Association.
Sales have dropped due to soaring prices, complain traders. Pic by M.A. Pushpa Kumara
The small and medium-scale poultry industry supports some 100,000 families. In addition, around 15,000 families cultivate maize for the industry.
The disruption in the supply-and-demand chain has driven chicken meat prices up. A kilogram of chicken which was around Rs. 700 in April is today Rs. 1,700. The price of an egg which was about Rs. 20 in April is between Rs. 55 and 60 today.
Poultry farmers’ association chief Ajith Gunasekera said the dollar crisis and the previous government’s decision to ban the import of chemical fertiliser had severely impacted the industry.
The fertiliser crisis affected the production of maize, the main ingredient in chicken feed. This in turn caused the maize prices to rise from Rs. 75 a kilogram to Rs. 260. Last year, the annual maize yield dropped to 75,000 metric tonnes from 400,000 metric tonnes the previous year.
With the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war disrupting the international supply chain, attempts to import maize also came a cropper. The dollar crisis also affected the import. The import of soybean, a key protein supplement used in the poultry diet, also came to a halt.
Mr. Gunasekera said that although the Government in October last year granted permission to import 265,000 metric tonnes of maize under the US$ 20 million Indian credit line, the facility could not be used effectively because of several red tapes.
In addition, the Covid pandemic also exasperated the situation with shipping companies increasing freight charges.
Meanwhile, the Lanka Meat Forum comprising 14 frozen and processed chicken meat producers said they were operating on a thin margin. Although the cost of production had soared, while they continued to sell frozen chicken at Rs. 1,250 a kilogram, the forum’s president, Ajith Weerasinghe, said. He said the recent VAT increase from 8 to 12 percent had also eaten into their profits.
He complained that the Government had been neglecting the industry and had not heeded their repeated requests to provide them fuel on a priority basis to transport their products. He said some desperate poultry companies bought fuel on the black market.
“These have added to the cost. We are operating at a low-profit margin,” he said.
Meanwhile, the United National Children Fund (UNICEF) in its 2022 report on malnutrition in South Asia has said Sri Lanka has the second highest rate of malnutrition in the region with 17% of children under 5 years suffering from chronic wasting.
It is estimated that around 1.7 million children have been affected in the recent economic crisis, with families living below the poverty line cutting down their three meals a day to two and two to one. Several children seeking treatment at the Lady Ridgeway Hospital were found to be malnourished, hospital director G. Wijesooriya said.
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