Check the chicken facts

Oh dear, here we go again. The new year is barely under way and chicken importers are already exaggerating, this time about rebates on chicken import tariffs (“Chicken rebates offer welcome relief, but severe supply chain challenges remain,” February 1).

Of course, importers welcomed trade, industry & competition minister Ebrahim Patel’s irrational rebate scheme to cancel or reduce chicken import tariffs as import duties are an opportunity for importers to increase profit margins.

They don’t seem to have passed on profits from low-priced dumped imports in the past, and there is no sign that they will do so now. Despite all his gushing about the supposed benefits of the scheme, Thomas is but the latest importer to make no commitment to ensure that all of any new discount gets through to consumers.

Roy Thomas writes as if the scheme is operational. It is not. Rebates are now available, but they have to be applied for, and hopefully the barriers indicated in the scheme will be applied as stated.

Rebate permits will be granted only if there is a shortage of chicken on the SA market, and if that shortage is caused by outbreaks of bird flu. Both conditions are necessary and neither applies at the moment.

Bird flu has abated, possibly temporarily. The shortage of chicken that importers predicted for late 2023 and into 2024 didn’t happen. Producers took measures, including importing more than 150-million hatching eggs, that averted a shortage.

Chicken is in oversupply now and prices are dropping, not rising as Thomas implies. We have to check the chicken facts, but Thomas’s claims may well be the first importers’ porky pies of 2024.

Francois Baird Founder, FairPlay