DA Shelves SRP, Import Orders for Chicken
PHILIPPINES - The Department of Agriculture has shelved a proposal to set suggested retail prices (SRP) for dressed chicken. Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala also said the DA will not issue, at least until 31 December, any import order for chicken because the country has ample supply."Chicken prices have steadily been going down. We figured it will be useless to set an SRP," Mr Alcala said in a news briefing yesterday right after he consulted with poultry stakeholders.
According to the latest daily monitoring of the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics, dressed chicken sells within the P115 to P150 per kilogram range.
The Union of Broilers and Raisers Association made the SRP proposal in March last year in a bid to address the price gap between farm gates and retail outlets. Dressed chicken back then was at around P130 per kilo.
GMA News reports that this month, the country’s inventory of frozen chicken is at 7,642 MT of which 4,846 MT is imported.
"We have enough chicken (supply) until yearend. There is no need to import beyond MAV (minimum access volume)," Mr Alcala also disclosed.
MAV is the minimum volume for specific agriculture products that members of the World Trade Organization have agreed to import at lower-than-regular tariff rates.
This year, the MAV volume is about 23,490 metric tons (MT), and as of 21 June, about 52 per cent or 12,000 MT has been imported.
DA figures showed that chicken imports zoomed by 565 percent to 87.88 million kilos in 2010 from only 13.24 million kilos a year earlier.