Bird Flu: No big impact on broiler, egg industries in Tamil Nadu

According to traders, there was a drop in the wholesale price of chicken from Palladam owing to fears that bird flu could spread over to Tamil Nadu from Kerala. Broiler Coordination Committee (BCC) Secretary K Chinnasamy said, “The industry sells 10 lakh kgs of chicken every day. This figure dropped by close to 2 lakh kgs a day since the news spread about the outbreak of bird flu in other states. This was reflected in wholesale prices, which dropped from Rs 70 per kg to Rs 60 per kg last week. However, the demand has increased after consumers became aware that Tamil Nadu was not affected. 

On November 1, we registered 10 lakh kgs sales and the price was revised to Rs 65 per kg.”   Chinnasamy was hopeful that the wholesale price will touch Rs 70 per kg in a day or two. He added that a few lakh kgs of chicken that wasn’t sold in the last few days, would be sold by the end of the weekend, with the increasing demand due to the start of the northeast monsoon. The egg industry in Namakkal witnessed an increase in the wholesale price of eggs. 

President of the Tamil Nadu Poultry Farmers Association, R Nallathambi claimed that the price of a single egg, which stood at Rs 3.93 last week increased to Rs 4.02. Deducting the packing and handling charges poultry farmers are now getting Rs 3.82 per egg. “We have carried out measures to check bird flu in our farms and there has not been a bird flu outbreak in Tamil Nadu over the years,” he said. Poultry farms in Namakkal send close to 80 lakh eggs a day to Kerala. A senior National Egg Coordination Committee spokesperson told DTNext that there is a possibility that the wholesale egg prices in Namakkal may go up. The BCC secretary said that the impact of the bird flu scare has reduced drastically with increasing awareness among consumers.