After being hit by frequent outbreak of bird flu-the last one being in West Bengal and Assam-things have finally started looking up for the Rs 20,000 crore Indian poultry industry.
Traders said in the last two weeks, chicken prices have gone up significantly because of rising demand from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and other northern states ahead of Holi festival. The retail price of dressed chicken in national capital region of Delhi have moved up from Rs 90-110 per kg last month to Rs 120 – Rs 130 at present, a rise of more than 30%.
Industry sources said that although poultry feed, mainly consisting of soybean meal and maize, prices have move up to Rs 17, 000 per tonne from Rs 14, 000 per tonne in October 2008, the demand from poultry products have pushed the prices up.
Poultry feed comprises of around 70% of the total cost of production of eggs and chicken. “After hit hard by bird flu, farmers have finally managed to sell their poultry stocks with reasonable margins,” Ricky Thaper, treasurer, Poultry Federation of India (PFI), told FE.
A Gurgaon based poultry farmer said that the live weight chicken is selling for Rs 62 per kg in Delhi market while the cost of production is around Rs 52 per kg. However, an official from Namakkal (Tamil Nadu)-based National Egg Co-ordination Committee (NECC), said that the prices are likely to come down after next few weeks as summer approaches and demand shrinks.
Indian poultry producers have been hit hard by the volatility in feed ingredients. The industry consumes close to 15 million tonne of feed with an estimated value of Rs 15,000 crore. After reports of outbreak of bird flu from West Bengal, Assam & Sikkim in the last one year, the domestic as well as international sales for poultry product have been badly impacted, which further compounded the problem of high feed prices.
“Although government has managed to take preventative steps for further spreading of the virus, the failure to create poultry zones has prevented it from providing a long-term solution,” the NECC official said.
India is the fifth largest broiler producer in the world with an estimated production of 2.3 million tonne of broiler meat per annum. However there is a huge scope for the growth of the poultry industry as India’s per capita consumption is only 2.4 kilogram per person per annum. Per capita consumption of broiler meat has grown at 10% in last 15 years and this growth is likely to continue, Thapar of PFI said.