Industry officials expect production to reach 2 million chickens per day by end of year CAIRO: Egyptian poultry producers are crediting an increase in production of chickens, not the recent reports of new cases of the Avian Flu Virus among birds, with the continuous decline in poultry prices for consumers. The live chicken per-kilo price went under the LE 9 mark in some Cairo neighbourhoods for the first time this month since they topped LE 12 in May. The relatively newly introduced frozen chickens have maintained their value at LE 12 to LE 13 per kilogram. Eggs across the market continue to hold at LE 0.60 per egg, compared with LE 0.25 to LE 0.30 prior to the appearance of the flu last winter. The drop in prices comes with the government s announcement of at least five new cases of Avian Flu in private poultry raising practices. One case was reported yesterday in the downtown area of Boulak and, last week, one case was reported in Sohag and three in Nasr City. Meanwhile, the Health Ministry reported the first human case on Tuesday, says Talib Ali, regional animal health and production officer for the Food and Agriculture Organization, a United Nations organization. We haven t done extensive surveillance in the country, says Ali. The actual [number of] cases might be more than what we ve discovered so far. Ali says the new Avian Flu cases were reported by the government s Central Poultry Laboratory, which collected 2,800 random samples from 200 villages in nine governorates. An effective survey, he says, must be conducted on a wider scale and be accompanied with fair compensation for poultry owners whose chickens are rounded up and destroyed. Ali says the government allocated just LE 50 million for compensation of 30 million culled chickens as a result of the virus spreading to Egypt last winter. A fair system needs to set aside at least LE 500 million for compensation, he says. Any surveillance system must be accompanied with a fare and transparent compensation scheme, says Ali. Otherwise people will not give up their chickens. As to the government s attempt to solve the problem by offering the public imported frozen chicken, Ali says the scale of importation is too small because of availability problems and the Egyptian public is not yet ready to change its taste for live chickens. Importing poultry is not like buying pencils from China, he says. You have to buy them from a country with no animal diseases, one that follows Islamic Sharia laws in slaughter and at a good price; so it s not easy. Still, the reappearance of the Avian Flu is not expected to affect the poultry industry as much as last year, says Mohamed A. El-Shafei vice chairman of the Egyptian Poultry Producers Association (EPPA) and managing director of Misr Arab Poultry Companies. El-Shafei says he expects poultry and egg prices to continue to drop as a result of the increase in production after the sudden drop experienced last year with the appearance of the flu. EPPA reports national production is up to 1.6 million chickens per day and expects the number to reach 2 million by the end of the year. Prior to the flu breakout, production was near 3 million chickens per day, according to Ali. [Reported Avian Flu cases] have all been among isolated private poulterers, says El-Shafei. What we re saying is the people must cooperate with the government. Private poulterers must immunize their chickens at veterinary clinics available all across the country at the expense of the government. El-Shafei says poultry prices should continue to drop and stabilize in November when the industry expects to reach total recovery from last winter s mass culling of chickens. Eggs, he says, should also experience a drop back to pre-flu levels once supply is allowed to catch up with the market demand, expected by November. Ali says until the government can properly compensate private poulterers and product prices drop, people will continue to break the law on the production and consumer sides for chicken, a traditionally cheap source of animal protein. People need animal protein, Ali says. People want meat; they want eggs. So they are ready to break any law. And with Ramadan coming and children going back to school, we have to keep in mind the strains current prices can put on the budget of an average-income family.
