September 10, 2007

Pakistan's poultry prices cool after hitting record prices

Pakistan's broiler prices began a retreat after hitting record retail prices of Rs 110 per kg last week.

Since then, broiler prices have shed nearly 20 percent of their value, drawing down Rs 20 per kg, to price at Rs 90 per kg currently.

The record prices for the past two weeks caused a 25 percent drop in demand of chicken and chicken related products.

Chief Convener, Pakistan Poultry Association, Maroof Siddiqui told local media that the record price increase during the past one month had impacted many consumers.

However, demand from most restaurants and five star hotels remained unaffected during the past two weeks.

The huge drop in demand helped to bring prices down despite expectations that the price decline would start only from first week of holy month of Ramadan, when the demand is usually low.

He predicted that the decline in the prices of live broiler and chicken meat would continue in the next few days.

However, Siddiqui warned that any decline in the price of chicken meat below Rs 145 to Rs 140 per kg would impact farmers heavily as most of them have yet to recover from recent disasters.