Sovereign Foods buckled under the pressure from rising feed costs and increased poultry imports as it swung into a loss in the six months to end-August. The poultry producer said late on Wednesday that the cost of feed per tonne was up 15% as a result of the drought that pushed up prices of primary feed ingredients maize and soya. Net selling prices declined 3% in the review period as a result of increases in poultry imports, which the industry has flagged as posing a possible danger to local jobs. Sovereign Foods said imports of bone-in products, from countries other than the US, had increased 28% in the eight months to August from the year-earlier period. The company incurred a net loss of R36.46m compared with a profit of R67.41m in the year-earlier period. Revenue was up 31% to R1.1bn. The results also included one-off costs of R17m relating to the successful defence of the hostile offer by Country Bird Holdings.
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