ISLAMABAD, Jan 22: The poultry industry is likely to increase prices of chicken through an artificial decrease in production in the next two weeks in order to make up for the Rs1 billion losses, it claimed to have suffered during the last few months.

Prices of chicken (broilers) have decreased to Rs50 per kg from Rs80-90 in the last three months mainly due to increase in production.

Sources in the Pakistan Poultry Association told Dawn here on Monday that farm owners were bearing Rs5-6 per kg losses. The main reason behind the decrease in the prices was the production that had surpassed consumption by almost 25 per cent in the recent months.

“We are now considering a decrease in production in order to create a balance between supply and demand. This will likely to jack-up chicken prices in the next 10 days,” an office bearer of the association said.

Some 650 million birds are produced every year in Pakistan – 54.1 million every month. And, a Rs5-6 loss to producers in every kilogramme of chicken meant more than Rs1 billion losses to the industry during the last three months, said a Rawalpindi-based businessman who runs many poultry farms.

“The next 10-15 days are very important (as far as the prices are concerned),” said Dr Aslam, a former president of the Pakistan Poultry Association.

He said that if the producers did not increase the price of chicken, they would not be in a position to sustain their businesses and ultimately they would have to close down their farms.

He said that it was natural that after every poultry crisis, prices had witnessed a sharp increase in Pakistan because there was no other alternative with the industry as the government never compensated them. During post-crisis periods, the poultry industry had not only recovered losses it suffered during the crisis but had also earned enough profits to cope with a similar situation in future.

He said that some 1.2 million people were associated with the poultry industry in Pakistan. During the last year’s bird flu crisis, the industry suffered Rs17 billion losses but the government only announced Rs10 million compensation, which was a peanut compared to the losses, he observed.

A high-level official of the ministry of food, agriculture and livestock (Minfal) told dawn that the poultry association should not intervene in the market and leave it to its natural flow of supply and demand.

He said that the increase in the production was due to the multiple

incentives announced by the government in this year’s federal budget that included abolition of duty and taxes on the import of raw materials including chicken feed and some other taxes. He said that the poultry industry had promised that after these incentives it would increase production in order to bring down prices to a reasonable level.

The official said that the present prices were very reasonable compared to the international market and that the poultry industry was making hue and cry despite the fact that it was reaping considerable profits.