Bird flu scare leaves poultry business in Andhra Pradesh dire straits

The avian flu scare in Andhra Pradesh has resulted in a drop in the consumption of chicken and eggs, severely impacting the poultry business.

In NTR district, around 7,000 broiler chicks, belonging to a farm at Anumollanka village, have died in the past two days, triggering fears of bird flu in Vijayawada.

However, the impact of the fear is not uniform across the city. Some shops claim that there is no change in the demand for chicken, while some others say there has been 50% drop in the footfall of customers in the past one week.

The RR Chicken Centre, a major retail shop in the city, says it has not registered any change in the demand for chicken.

But for Uma Maheswara Rao, who sells chicken and mutton in Ayyappa Nagar, the impact is more. “Two days ago, we decided to stop the sale of chicken lest the demand for mutton too would go down. Now, more customers are coming to buy mutton. But we have not increased the prices,” he says.

In other places in the city, chicken prices have dropped by ₹30 to ₹50 per kg, while the prices of mutton have increased by up to ₹100. At present, a kg of mutton is being sold at around ₹900 while chicken is being sold at around ₹220 per kg, with a drop of ₹30 from last week.

According to Andhra Pradesh Poultry Federation vice-president T. Kutumba Rao, the average drop in chicken prices in the State stands between ₹25 and ₹30 per kg.

“While the consumption of eggs has not seen a sharp decline, the prices have come down. The egg business in the State has incurred a loss of approximately ₹100 crore in the past two weeks,” says Mr. Kutumba Rao, adding that when it comes to the poultry business, both consumption and prices have come down.

However, he expects normalcy to return soon as restrictions on the movement of vehicles outside the red zones (infected zones) have been relaxed. “Only those in the red zone need to be careful,” he says.

Much of the hullabaloo over the bird flu comes from misguided notions people have, says P.J. Reddy, assistant general manager of Sneha Fresh Chickens, Vijayawada.

“It is advisable that people go for completely boiled eggs instead of half-boiled. Other than that, there is no harm in consuming chicken or eggs because boiling kills all bacteria and viruses,” he says. The company has been incurring losses of ₹1 crore every day for the past one week.

He said the chicken prices may go up in the March second or third week, to recover the losses. “The virus does not survive in high temperatures. We are hoping it is only a temporary situation,” adds Mr. Reddy.