LAHORE: The Pakistan Poultry Association has sought abolition of various taxes imposed on the sector in a bid to reduce malnutrition.

“In order to fill in the protein gap and to provide additional poultry products there is a definite need to expand the sector. The production of poultry should be rapidly increased at low input cost,” said PPA Patron-in-Chief Khalil Sattar. “But the proposed mini-budget totally makes it impossible to achieve this,” he added.

The poultry industry was growing 8 to 10 per cent annually for the last few years contributing significantly to the GDP. However, the proposed taxes on the poultry products will undo all the efforts put in by the industry to support the PM’s vision to reduce malnutrition.

Prior to the proposed mini-budget, a grandparent day old chick, which costs USD 54 cents, attracted 3pc customs duty and 2pc additional customs duty - a tax impact of Rs486.

The proposed 17pc sales tax would cost an additional Rs1,735 and the total tax impact of sales tax and customs duties would be Rs2,221 per grandparent chick.

Sattar said the poultry feed currently costs Rs86,200 per tonne and 60 per cent of the input cost is of sales tax and import duties on micro and macro raw materials, which amounts to approximately Rs8,000 per tonne, which varies on different lines of feed and formulations.

Published in Dawn, January 6th, 2022