“The chicken market has collapsed completely, first due to the rumours that associated coronavirus with chicken and now the lockdown to fight the virus. We are left with poultry feed that will last for only a couple of days. If the supply of the feed does not resume soon, chickens will die,” said Ghulam.
Mohammad, who runs a farm of 16,000 layer chickens in the Bahraich district of Uttar Pradesh. For two months, the poultry business has been going through one of its worst phases due to rumours that the coronavirus spreads through chicken meat. Now, it faces another big problem — of chicken feed not reaching the poultry farmers due to the lockdown across the country.
The poultry feed includes bajra, maize, soybean cake, mustard cake, stone and medicines, but nothing is available in the market due to the lockdown. Bajra comes from Punjab and maize from Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan, while stone comes from Himachal Pradesh.
Ghulam Mohammad said: “I had already paid the company an advance of Rs 4,98,000 for the feed. Now they are unable to deliver it as the authorities are not allowing their vehicle to come. We get the feed from Banaras and Muzaffarpur. Since they are not allowed to leave, they are not able to come.”
The shortage of feed has also affected egg production. Ghulam Mohammad said earlier he was able to produce 13,000 eggs every day; now, it has come down to 10,000-12,000
Ghulam Ali, who has a poultry farm, in Jalandhar, Punjab, about 980 km from Banaras, also faces the same problem. Jalandhar Feeds which supplies poultry feeds, used to produce up to 100 tonnes every day. Now, the production has fallen to 10-20 tonnes a day.
“At first, people harbored the misconception that consuming chicken will spread corona, now when people have finally understood the truth, the cities are locked down. While the government had assured that feed trucks will be allowed to move, policemen are not allowing it,” said Sameer Agarwal, manager of the company.
Uttara Feed produces poultry feeds at Banaras and Phulpur and supplies them throughout the state. Saryu Pathak, its sales manager, said: “Despite the goods being ready and the government saying that feed trucks should be allowed to move, no driver is willing to work. The drivers are afraid that the police will apprehend them.”
Trains, which also transport feed, are not running either due to the lockdown.
According to an estimate, the Indian poultry and feed sector has incurred a loss of Rs 1,750 crore between mid-January and February.
Uttar Pradesh gets 1 crore to 1.25 crore eggs from outside the state every day. With that supply disrupted, farmers within the state are seeing some benefits. Ghulam Mohammad said, “Every single egg that we produce is now getting sold locally in Bahraich, because eggs from outside have stopped coming.”
Ali Akbar, the president of Uttar Pradesh Poultry Association, an organisation of more than 5,000 poultry traders, said, “At first, the rumours caused much damage, and now it is the lockdown. But if chickens do not get the feed, they will die.
“For a long time, the poultry business has been running in a loss. Last year, poultry feed was expensive. Now, the business has again got affected due to coronavirus.”
