BAU: Poultry farmers are appealing to the state government to subsidise the industry further because of increasing production costs.
Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Datuk Seri Alexander Nanta Linggi, who echoed the sentiment, said he hopes that the state government could step in and provide sufficient subsidies to stabilise the chicken and egg market.
He argued that the initiative would complement the subsidy provided by the federal government recently to alleviate production costs – setting aside over RM500 million for the measure.
“The federal government has approved a subsidy of more than RM500 million to assist poultry farmers.
“However, the farmers have expressed their concerns for other issues. The cost of chicken feed is a major problem as the materials need to be imported from foreign countries. There’s also the labour shortage due to increasing costs,” he said during a press conference after a working visit to CCK Chicken Farm at Kampung Buso here yesterday (Feb 26).
“I hope we at the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry and the state’s Modernisation Of Agriculture And Regional Development Ministry can together find ways to help this industry so that consumers are not hit by lack of chickens and eggs, especially for the coming fasting season, Eid and Gawai Dayak,” he said.
Nanta assured that his ministry had already set the retail prices of chickens and eggs at all levels, but the current issue now lies in the high production costs borne by poultry farmers.
On the suggestion that the state should intervene, he said the relevant authorities should consider the health and continuation of the industry.
On how fast the problem could be solved, he said there was no specific timeframe as to when poultry farm could receive help.
“It is not within my capacity to set a timeline. All of this is up to the Sarawak government,” he said.
