While South Africa hopes to develop a booming chicken export business, poultry imports are declining.
The latest available figures, for April 2025, show that despite a bump in monthly imports, chicken imports for the first four months are the lowest in three years. The total for the year to April is 117 000 tonnes, down from nearly 160 000 tonnes in 2022.
Most of the monthly rise was due to a 22% increase in imports of mechanically deboned meat (MDM), a paste used in the production of processed meats such as polony. Nearly all other categories, including offal (-26%), the other big component of chicken imports, declined in April.
MDM and offal (chicken heads, feet, livers etc) made up 82% of South Africa’s chicken imports in April, and most of it came from Brazil. All imports from Brazil have been banned since a bird flu outbreak at a Brazilian poultry facility in May.
Following an agreement with Brazil this week, that ban will be restricted to the province where the outbreak occurred, and imports from other provinces will be allowed.
