May 20, 2010

Intense heat conditions in New Delhi, India have resulted to lower production of birds, making retail broiler prices to rise more sharply.

Poultry industry sources aid the wholesale live weight broiler prices in Delhi. Surrounding areas have increased to INR 78-80 (US$1.68-1.72) per kilogramme from INR 65-68 (US$1.40-1.46) per kilogramme prevailing just a month back. This has resulted in retail price increase of dressed broiler to INR 140-150 (US$3.01-3.22) a kilogramme from INR 120-130 (US$2.58-2.79) per kilogramme.

During summer, farmers had to make additional investments such as water cooler and creation of more space for keeping the birds cool, which usually lead to rise in the inputs cost while smaller farmers prefer to close down their farms.

Meanwhile, the stiff decline in exports of soymeal, a key component of poultry feed, in comparison to last year mainly because of reports about bumper soy output in Brazil and the US has helped in keeping the feed prices down.

The soymeal prices have declined to INR 15,300 per tonne on Wednesday, May 19, compared to INR 19,000 per tonne last January 2010. Because of bumper corn crop in Bihar, prices have also come down to INR 9,800 at present compared to INR 11,200 per tonne of the same period.

"As both corn and soymeal are the main ingredients of broiler feed so the feed cost has come down by almost 20% to INR 16,400 per tonne at present which is helping the farmers," Ricky Thapar, spokesperson for Poultry Federation of India (PFI), said. He said that broilers prices would remain high for the next few months.

Meanwhile, Indore-based Soyabean Processors Association of India's (SOPA) said country's soymeal export has slumped by 40% to INR 2,925.98 crore from October 2009 to April 2010 as against on-year on lesser crushing and low arrivals in the market.