October 25, 2011

Pakistani sacrificial cattle's prices up

On the eve of Eidul Azha, prices of sacrificial animals rose at district cattle markets in upper Sindh while prices are comparative lower in the lower Sindh districts as they have been hit by flood.

Livestock traders from Karachi, Faisalabad, Lahore and Gujranawala have thronged these rain-ravaged districts and set up their camps there to purchase sacrificial animals and send them onward to their hometowns to fetch better prices.

According to the Director General of Sindh Livestock Department, Dr Ghulam Sarwar, around 232,000 large and small animals had perished in recent deluge in Sindh. He said that animals had also lost their weight in rain-affected areas of lower Sindh due to none-availability of chaff and grass.

In the desert area where there was no grass and water to graze animals, cattle owners were shifting their herds to areas of Badin, Mirpurkhas, Tando Allahyar, Sanghar, Tando Mohammad Khan and Shaheed Benazirabad where water had receded.

He said the remaining 250,000-300,000 cattle heads in the desert area would be shifted to safer places within a week. Due to reduced weights of animals, prices of livestock had fallen in lower Sindh. Most affected were cattle owners who had fewer cattle heads, he said.