The Pakistan Poultry Association (PPA) announced special stalls to provide customers with subsidised chicken meat.
Raja Attiqueur Rehman Abbasi, the vice-chairman of Pakistan Poultry Association, said that the facility had already been started from 20th of November while 60 more stalls had also been set up on 21st of November at a Lahore market where subsidised chicken meat was being sold.
He urged the government to allow free-market mechanism function to regulate demand and supply and not to intervene in market prices.
Raja Attique said that the poultry sector contributes 40% to the total meat consumption and it supplies prime quality protein food in the form of poultry meat and eggs at a very affordable price.
He added that Pakistan Poultry has an annual turnover of over 800 billion rupees, gives employment to over 1.5 million people directly and indirectly and we are producing 1,322 million kg of chicken meat and 17,500 million table eggs annually.
Raja Attique continued: “Rates of products are based on demand and supply mechanism. The poultry is a perishable item that can’t be stored for long and has to be sold. Therefore, most of the times poultry farmers has to sell their broiler below the cost of production.
“Farmers during the last six months were selling day-old chicks and broilers at an average price of Rs4-20 and Rs 90- 130 respectively while the cost of production of day-old chick was Rs45 and Rs160 of chicken meat.”
He stressed the association through various press conferences and press releases had fully abreast the government that the situation would lead to acute shortage of poultry products as the losses would result in a reduction in production and that prices will shoot up.