Poultry sector wants duties on maize, soya imports to go

With shortage of feed staring at it, the poultry industry has asked the Union Government to remove duties on import of maize and soya to bail out the farmers. Severe drought across the country has resulted in poor flow of maize and soya, the main feed for the industry.

“There will be a shortfall of 4 mt of maize and 2-3 mt of soya. This would mean an additional expenditure of 20-30 per cent than what we spend in a normal season. This would cause the industry heavy losses,” G B Sundararajan, Managing Director of Suguna Foods Pvt Ltd, one of the largest poultry players in the country, told Business Line .

Price burden Price of maize is ruling at ₹1,650 a quintal as against normal price of ₹1,300, while soya is selling at ₹4,000 a quintal as against last year’s ₹3,000.

Other poultry industry leaders echoed this view at the Poultry India 2015 expo where stakeholders from various parts of India assembled to discuss the challenges the industry is facing.

“The other challenge we face is huge import duties on vitamins, chemicals and amino acids. We don’t manufacture them here but are very crucial in the health of the birds. We are paying about 22 per cent duty on these items, making us less competitive internationally. We want the government to either remove the duties or reduce drastically,” a representative of a poultry firm, who doesn’t want to be quoted, said.

Centre’s response The industry representatives submitted a memorandum to the Government to consider removal of the duties.

The government has said it is actively considering removal of import duties on maize and soya as it did four years ago. “The government removed the duties in 2012 when the country faced a similar drought. We will discuss the poultry industry’s appeal. We will take it up with the Union Agriculture Minister,” Sanjay R Bhoosreddy, Joint Secretary, Government of India, said.

FCI offer Meanwhile, the Government has asked the Food Corporation of India (FCI) to intimate the poultry industry stakeholders about the sale of damaged grain that’s not fit for human consumption. “The FCI will make the availability of such grain online, indicating the quantities in different godowns across the country. The poultry farms can pitch and buy the grains at subsidised rates,” he said.

He said the Ministry had released a Poultry Farm Manual, listing out good practices that can be followed by the farms.