Poultry farmers seek better facilities to take on MNCs

Poultry farmers in the state have sought new marketing avenues and a campaign to increase domestic consumption of poultry products to counteract competition from multinationals who have made inroads into the Indian market.

At an interactive session organised here by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) recently, farmers, exporters, bankers, Agricultural & Processed Food Export Development Authority (Apeda) and Nabard officials, discussed the problems facing the poultry industry and resolved to make the sector strong to withstand any negative impact of the WTO guidelines. The participants focused on various aspects of the industry in Andhra Pradesh.

Farmers were of the opinion that a 5 per cent interest subsidy on all bank loans would help them take on the MNCs.

While the US poultry giant, Tyson, a month turnover of which is more than the total annual turnover achieved by Indian units, is planning to enter the Indian meat market next year, Australia has already sought the opening of the Indian poultry market to its exporters. Besides, Cargyl, with a turnover of $53.9 billion, Craft with $31 billion and Nestle with $54 billion are all set to trigger cut-throat competition in India.

Meat exporters wanted better facilities and incentives as the importing countries are getting more cautious about quality, phytosanitary conditions, residue of antibiotics, metabolites and vaccines.

While complaining of the supply of unhygienic chicks by farmers, exporters urged for speedy setting up of agri export zones (AEZs). They lamented the delay in setting up of an AEZ in East Godavari district and launching of a testing unit in Hyderabad.

"Of the two egg processing units, only one is operating and the cold storage unit constructed in Hyderabad with Apeda loan is lying unused."

Farmers also wanted sufficient number of disease diagnostic and feed analysis labs. Their other demand was recognition of poultry as industry.

Andhra Pradesh ranks first in egg production in the country, with one third of eggs (14,860 million eggs) and one-sixth of broiler chicken meat (162 million kg dressed broiler meat and 31.2 crore broiler hatching eggs).

The sector contributes Rs 3,517 crore to the gross state domestic product (GSDP) and provides direct jobs for 3 lakh people. The per capita egg and meat availability is 173 and 3.5 kg respectively.

Farmers produce 4 crore eggs a day from 5.4 crore improved layers.

While appealing for waiver of sales tax on processed chicken, egg powder, feed ingredients, and exemption of eggs and broilers from market cess, they also sought hassle-free loans.

The consumption of eggs in Andhra is only 1.30 crore, hence the remaining 64 per cent is exported to other states. There are 56 broiler hatcheries and 10 layer hatcheries rearing about 6.2 million layer parents and 15.65 lakh broiler parents.

From these hatcheries, about 3.5 million layers and 11.7 million broiler chicks are sold per month within the state and 7.5 million broiler-hatching eggs per month are exported to other states (West Bengal, Maharashtra and Orissa).

Fifty per cent of broiler production in the state (60-70 per cent chicks per month) is through contract farming with nine integrators having a major say in the field. There are five pure line breeding (Bovris, Hubchicks, Lohman, Indian Rivr, Stare bro) farms in the state.

Countering competition

Farmers opined that a 5 per cent interest subsidy on all bank loans would help them take on the MNCs

Meat exporters wanted better facilities and incentives as the importing countries are getting more cautious about quality, phytosanitary conditions, residue of antibiotics, metabolites and vaccines

Recognition of poultry as industry too was sought