‘Unsustainable Situation’ Leads The NFU Poultry Chairman To Reconsider
UK - NFU poultry board chairman Charles Bourns has admitted he is considering his own future as a poultry producer, as feed costs hit his business hard.
7 September 2007
2 minute read
A price of £238/t is forecast by early 2008, with the extra £57/t set to push his costs up by another £88,000 per annum. That is the equivalent of £3.50 per 100 chicks, or about 13.62p per kg.
He rears 57,000 birds a year in five flocks on his farm on the southern edge of the Cotswolds.
His feed price has gone up from £151/tonne a year ago to £181/t today, adding over £40,000 to his costs. But the worst is yet to come. A price of £238/t is forecast by early 2008, with the extra £57/t set to push his costs up by another £88,000 per annum. That is the equivalent of £3.50 per 100 chicks, or about 13.62p per kg.
Yet so far the price for his chickens has not shifted accordingly. Historically, he said, when feed cost has increased, producer prices have gone up. In 1995-96 when his feed price hit £218/t, his liveweight price was 68.5p/kg. Today his liveweight price is just 56/kg.
“Some supermarkets are engaged in a price war at the expense of farmers and there are real concerns the natural market rise expected at the farm-gate is just not going to happen,” he said.
