No ban on chicken imports despite glut

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines has decided not to suspend the entry of imported chicken meat and its products despite calls from stakeholders to temporarily ban the importation  amid a glut resulting in the decline of farm gate prices.

The Department of Agriculture (DA) recently met with meat importers, Philippine Association of Meat Processors Inc. (PAMPI) and Meat Importers and Traders Association (MITA) to discuss issues confronting the broiler industry.

The consultation was spearheaded by the Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI) and National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS) following calls to temporarily ban for two months the importation of chicken.

“The DA group themselves expressed that the temporary import ban on chicken is not recommended,” PAMPI spokesperson Rex Agarrado told The STAR.

“We ended the consultation with the agreement that the import ban will not be endorsed,” he said.

Last month, the United Broiler Raisers’ Association requested that the government suspend the importation immediately as the glut has gravely damaged the poultry industry.

In its presentation, BAI said temporary suspension is only recommended when there are on-going transboundary animal diseases and there are food safety and public health risks.

“We don’t hesitate to ban countries but banning exports is not a local event,” BAI said.

Poultry stakeholders continue to bear the brunt of the pandemic amid oversupply due to delivery failure between producers and consumers.

BAI said the strict quarantine checkpoints, closure of food shops, offices and hotels, and the loss of income all contributed to the drastic decrease of demand for chicken meat.

Since banning imports is no longer an option, the government will impose additional guidelines on the approval of sanitary and phytosanitary import clearance for meat commodities.

“NMIS has reported congestion of frozen meat in accredited cold storage warehouses. Some traders have resorted in the use of plug in refrigerated vans,” BAI director Ronnie Domingo said in a text message.

“This new practice is outside the scope of accreditation standards. The issuance is one of the measures to find out where the meat traders intend to keep their shipments,” he said.

The validation of the cold storage situation is one of DA’s short-term solutions including a new delivery system and an open communication among DA, importers, buyers and local poultry players.

In the medium term, there would be industry self-regulation on the level of production by each region or enterprise to prevent oversupply, processing of excess chicken into canned products, and strict implementation of accreditation protocol for foreign meat exporters.

Further, in the long term, it was suggested that there would be an establishment of a consolidation and reformatting facility to match the farm produce with the volume and format requirements of local processors.

The government will also develop export-quality products and export markets, as well as the construction of strategically located cold storage facilities, dressing plants and cutting plants.