May 15, 2012

 

Bangladesh to resume Indian eggs, day-old chicks import

 

 

A proposal to resume import of eggs and day-old chicks (DOC) from India are actively being considered by the Bangladesh authorities, as the local poultry sector is being hit by avian flu hard and high feed prices fail to meet local demand, officials said.

 

Myanmar and Thailand can also be new sources of import for the items, as poultry sector is thriving in these two Southeast Asian countries, traders said.

 

Meanwhile, price of per piece of egg and per kilogramme of chicken have risen by around 10% and 30% to some BDT10.00 (US$0.12) and BDT165 (US$2.02) respectively in retail market.

 

Local poultry farmers have also increased the price of a DOC by BDT15 (US$0.18) to BDT65 (US$0.80) on an average, though they have been enjoying 20% government subsidy on power tariff since 1992, industry sources said.

 

The existing prices of eggs and DOCs are some cent percent more than their prices in neighbouring countries like India and Myanmar.

 

"We are considering the proposal to resume import of eggs and DOCs for a limited period, as their local prices have already gone out of purchasing capacity of the majority consumers," an official of the Ministry of Commerce (MoC) told the FE.

 

However, the problem is that most of the Asian poultry-producing countries have records of bird-flu outbreak in recent years, he said.

 

All advantages and disadvantages of such import are being examined, as poultry has been a thriving sector in Bangladesh, until it was severely hit by occasional outbreaks of bird-flu since 2007.

 

The prices of eggs started rising gradually once again since the beginning of the current fiscal year (2011-12), as egg import ceased after procurement of 20 million eggs from India, traders said.

 

The authorities concerned in a special consideration allowed import of 20 million eggs from India in the previous fiscal to keep its prices stable in the local market after price of an egg soared to BDT7.50 (US$0.09) at retail level.

 

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in its latest report said Bangladesh's poultry sector had been hit hard due to re-emergence of bird-flu and high prices of poultry feed. An estimated 6,000 poultry farms have been closed in the country since the beginning of the year because of avian influenza (bird-flu) and high feed costs, the FAO report said.

 

According to a federation of poultry farmers associations in Bangladesh, the number of poultry firms have come down to 54,000 in 2012 from a total of 115,000 in 2010, following outbreak of bird-flu, rise of poultry feed prices and other related costs.

 

Besides, the industry lost BDT70 billion (US$857 million) after the outbreak of bird-flu in 2007. Around 50% layer firms, 70% breeders and hatcheries, and 45% broiler firms have been closed, a data of Bangladesh Poultry Khamar Rakkha Jatiya Parishad said.

 

It said the production of DOCs reduced to some 4.3 million in 2012 from the previous production level of about 9.10 million per year. The growth of the poultry sector has faced a setback mainly due to high feed prices and the resurgence of bird-flu outbreaks in Asia, the FAO report said.