The competitiveness of the South African poultry industry is increasing, and South African producers are well placed to compete in markets such as the European Union.
This is the view of the independent Bureau for Food and Agricultural Policy (BFAP), which since 2015 has analysed the South African industry’s competitive status chicken compared to producers in the EU, the United States and Brazil.
The surveys have been conducted in co-operation with one of the world’s leading agricultural research institutes, the University of Wageningen in the Netherlands.
Its latest survey, covering 2021, showed South Africa is still more competitive than the EU poultry producers, and that the differential with US and Brazil, which benefit from lower feed costs, has narrowed.
“South African producers remain competitive and were shown to produce a kg of chicken meat at a lower cost relative to the European producers included in the sample, but also at a higher cost than leading exporters such as the USA and Brazil. This difference to Brazil and the USA declined in 2021 relative to 2017,” the BFAP said.
Carcass valuations and the premium obtained in the EU for breast meat would have to be taken into account, particularly in the light of the planned export drive which is part of the poultry master plan, the report said.
