Poultry industry badly hit

Nizamabad: The demonetisation of the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes has taken a toll on the poultry farming in the district. Farmers are reluctant to take up poultry as they started incurring losses. The price of eggs and chicken has fallen drastically and it has become difficult to find labourers for growing poultry farms.

The situation is so bad that not even ten farms were set in the district during the last three years. The losses incurred on eggs has risen to Rs 1.50 crore and those producing broiler chicken has lost more than Rs 1 crore. However, with the State government announcing that it would come to their rescue, the farmers have heaved a sigh of relief.

Under the present circumstances, it is not possible to make profits on eggs or chicken. Speaking to The Hans India here on Friday, farmers lamented that they incurred lot of losses in this business and they do not see hope of making profits in future.

There are a total of 200 broiler chicken farms in the district producing 16 lakh eggs and as some of the eggs break up, 15 per cent of them are completely Around 10 lakh hens and cocks are slaughtered for making chicken. Besides, 5 per cent of the hens perish for some reason or the other.

While the farmers were facing all the above mentioned problem, the ban on the big currency notes have come as a bolt from the blue for them and they are unable to recover from the shock. With the ban, the price of an egg fell from Rs 4.30 to Rs 3.00 hitting the farmer hard.

However, there was a slight rise to Rs 3.65 giving the farmers some relief. Farmers said that unless each egg fetches Rs. 4.30, they would not be in a position to make profits.

Similarly, the price of broiler chicken fell From Rs 100 to Rs 60 per kg putting the cultivators at a loss. The produces are also finding it difficult to pay labour charges to their workers and hope that the government does something to mitigate their suffering.