South Africa’s poultry industry hopes that Ebrahim Patel, minister of trade, industry and competition, will bring the anti-dumping duties against Brazil into force in August.
After months of rapid increases, the decline of South African food price inflation should encourage the government to act against the South American country’s chicken imports.
When Patel delayed the implementation of anti-dumping duties last August, he expressed fears that they would have added to rising food prices. So he gave Brazilian chicken producers another 12 months “in which to dump as much chicken in South Africa as they liked”.
What will Patel do next?
According to FairPlay Movement, now that the 12-month period is nearly up, Patel is yet to give an indication of whether he will announce a further delay, or bring the anti-dumping duties into force in August.
“The poultry industry was hugely disappointed. Producers felt any price increases would be minimal, while dumped imports would add to the woes of a distressed industry battling rising costs, poor transport infrastructure, and debilitating power cuts,” FairPlay said.
During the past year, the industry has been distressed by steadily rising input costs and a lengthy period of daily power cuts.
The few cases of H7 bird flu in South Africa’s poultry industry are also worrying. According to Wandile Sihlobo, this is at a time when the poultry sector has been under a challenging period of higher feed costs, failing municipalities, and energy issues.
“Still, this is not a food security issue; folks can go on with their daily lives and not worry much,” Sihlobo said.
Master plan failure
According to FairPlay, chicken producers also felt let down that government was not fulfilling its side of the poultry master plan signed in 2019.
“The industry undertook to invest in additional expansion and job creation and has more than fulfilled that promise.
“The government undertook to act firmly against dumped imports, but failed to do so despite clear evidence of dumping by Brazil, Denmark, Ireland, Poland, and Spain.”
The industry has repeatedly urged Patel to impose the duties instead of waiting for 12 months.
“With food inflation finally going down, and likely to stay down, the South African poultry industry will hope minister Patel finds no more excuses and at last puts a stop to Brazil’s chicken dumping.”
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