By NEWSDAY REPORTER Wednesday, September 1 2010

THERE is a shortage of chicken, president of the TT Cottage Processors’ Association Rasheed Karim confirmed yesterday. Karim said the shortage was as a result of recent flooding which affected many areas in the country in July and early August.

“This was something I predicted over 14 weeks ago. Our problems began with the flood when many chicken pens were flooded out in places such as Barrackpore,” Karim said. He also said his association had asked poultry producers to communicate with them on the situation, but this did not happen.

“Now we have 50 percent less chicken on the market, which is causing a major problem,” said Karim.

Karim said many poultry shops now have birds as small as two pounds for sale and this would be so for several weeks.

Karim said he expects a “chicken grab” over the next weeks which might result in the price of chicken rising by as much as 50 cents. However, he assured that poultry shops in Cental Trinidad will maintain normal prices, “unless producers carry their prices up further”.

Robin Phillips, Marketing Manager at Arawak and also the acting President of the Poultry Association also confirmed the shortage. However, unlike Karim, he did not blame the shortage on recent flooding.

“We had an oversupply of chicken in March and April which resulted in local producers lessening their prices,” said Phillips. He explained that the recent election campaigns and World Cup football resulted in a big spike in demand for chicken by operators of restaurants and private caterers.

“There was a short fall of imported chicken in the market since the importers decided not to import due to the lowered local prices,” said Phillips. The local producers had to fill this gap and sell their chickens before readiness. He said as a result, this resulted in the shortage on the market.

However, Phillips explained that currently producers have very large quantities of chicken. “Quantities which we produce at Christmas would be produced in September or October,” said Phillips.

This, Phillips explained would regularise the market once again. “Supplies are very tight but we would keep up with it. This should regularise within three weeks or so...by the end of September,” said Phillips. He said chicken prices at present are approximately $5.50 per pound and he does not anticipate this to change. “There should be no hike in prices as local producers have acted in a very responsible manner in keeping prices down,” he said.