On behalf of South African poultry producers, SAPA’s Izaak Breitenbach has stressed the need for government compensation for culled chickens and repeated the industry’s opposition to temporary rebates on import tariffs.
Culling is a key part of the government’s “stamping out” policy to prevent the spread of bird flu. When any chickens die of bird flu, the whole flock, plus nearby flocks, have to be culled. In other countries, farmers are compensated for these mandatory culls, but not in South Africa.
Breitenbach said that, in three bird flu outbreaks since 2017, 13 million chickens had been culled without farmers receiving a cent in compensation.
So far this year, some 7.5 million chickens have been culled, costing meat and egg producers nearly R5 billion. Breitenbach said broiler producers had lost about R1.8 billion, while Dr Abongile Balarane of Sapa’s egg organisation said the losses suffered by egg producers could reach R3 billion.
Breitenbach said compensation was also a critical disease control measure. Because of the no-compensation policy egg producers in particular were resisting culling, which enabled the disease to spread.
He appealed to the government to fast track the approval of bird flu vaccines.
Opposing the proposal for rebates on import tariffs to encourage increased chicken imports to alleviate a supply shortage, Breitenbach said rebates were not necessary and would in any case come too late to boost supply this year.
Not only would the production shortage be alleviated, but long lead times for chicken imports meant that once any rebates were approved, the product would only arrive after the supposed shortages in November and December this year.
“Support local poultry production, job security and national food security,” he told the parliamentarians.
