POULTRY SECTOR
New export markets sought in bid to save SA’s chicken industry
Market-access requests have been sent to Gulf and African states, as well as Hong Kong and Singapore in South Asia
The government is seeking to establish new export markets for the local poultry industry in a bid to save it from collapse. The local poultry sector has shed hundreds of jobs in recent months and blames this on cheap chicken imports. The industry and unions say that the EU is selling chicken legs, thighs and wings below cost and have called on the government to intervene. But the EU has said its farmers are simply more competitive than their counterparts in SA. The state has established a task team to tackle the crisis. Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Senzeni Zokwana said his department had sent market-access requests to the EU, the Gulf countries and Angola, Kenya, Swaziland, Tanzania and Uganda. Requests had also gone to Hong Kong and Singapore in South Asia. Zokwana told Parliament on Monday that the requests for market access were already yielding results as Qatar had responded positively. Kuwait had agreed to the importation of processed poultry products from SA, a...
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