Reeling under the worst-ever crisis in the wake of widespread drought conditions, the poultry industry in Andhra Pradesh has expressed concern over the soaring cost of production.
Stating that the foreseen shortfall in oilseeds and cereals production has added to its woes, it appealed for help from both the centre and the state.
The centre should effect duty waiver on imports of maize, and supply wheat at export prices, while the state government could lift sales tax on poultry feed and raise consumption by supplying eggs twice a week for the mid-day meal scheme, the Andhra Pradesh Poultry Federation president, M P Seshaiah, said.
Describing the grevity of the situation, he informed that the average price realisation for egg, cull bird, broiler bird had fallen drastically over the last two years, even as the feed prices were spiralling.
In the years 2000 and 2002, the average egg price was Rs 1.19 and Rs 1.08, cull bird Rs 33 and Rs 27, broiler bird Rs 29 and Rs 25.
The broiler bird and cull bird prices are now hovering at Rs 24 and Rs 20 respectively. The actual cost of production for a broiler works out to Rs 30.
The current average egg production cost is Rs 1.35. Contrast the situation to the feed segment wherein the prices shot from Rs 4500 in 2000 to Rs 6,500 in 2002, he said.
The increase in production of birds, eggs in neighbouring states to the extent of nearly one crore is also seen to contributing to the fall in prices.
The APPF president said that there was across-the-board price hike for major feed ingredients like maize, jowar, soya, ricebran etc. Some ingredients like broken rice are already in dearth due to drought.
The major ingredient maize has been stagnant at 11 million tonnes in the country during the past five years.
The maize demand in the country is over 12 million tonnes inclusive of five million tonnes by the poultry units.
As other cereals and oilseeds are expected to be in short supply, it would further increase the demand for maize which recently touched Rs 6,000 a tonne as against Rs 4,800 in the same period last year.
This, he said, stresses the need for duty-free maize imports to meet the shortfall and also stabilise the feed prices.
The APPF president placed the maize shortfall in Andhra Pradesh alone at over 35 per cent.
The current demand is for 1.35 million tonnes as against the availability of a mere million tonnes, he noted.
On the centre's offer to supply wheat, the APPF president said the federation had appealed for allotment of three lakh tonnes of wheat through the FCI at the export market price of Rs 435 per tonne against the market price offer of Rs 710.
In order to impress upon the government and the political parties the plight of poultry industry, the poultry federation is organising a conference with the ministers and political leaders in the city on March 17.
The conference is expected to urge the government and the party leaders for waiver of value-added tax (VAT) and excise duty on poultry products, and one year moratorium on loans to the sector.
