Poultry: ‘Back trade war with EU’

THE FOOD and Allied Workers Union (Fawu) has asked MPs to support a “trade war” with the EU to help save the South African poultry industry from demise.

Briefing Parliament’s portfolio committee on agriculture, forestry and fishers, Fawu general secretary Katishi Masemola said the EU was selling breast portions to their member countries at premium prices and “dumping” leg quarters in South Africa at “ridiculously low prices”.

This, he said, had already led to a few thousand jobs being shed in the local industry. “The situation is going to get even more dire if nothing is done so tens of thousands of these jobs are at stake,” Masemola told ANA on the sidelines of the meeting with MPs.

“By June, it wouldn’t be far-fetched to talk about close to between 5 000 and 7 000 jobs which are likely to come to an end.”

South Africa’s biggest poultry company, Astral Foods, had reduced hours for workers and closed some shifts, reducing the weekly pay of its employees instead of complete retrenchment, Fawu told MPs. At Rainbow chicken, the second biggest poultry company in the country, 1 350 jobs were lost due to the firm closing some of its farms in KwaZulu-Natal and down-scaling of its processing operation. Masemola also informed MPs the third biggest company, Country Bird Holdings, had announced the closure of three of its abattoirs, meaning several hundred workers are likely to be laid off. He said workers were feeling trepidation, hoping government would do something to help save their jobs. – ANA