By Petulia Clarke, Staff ReporterA GLUT IN Jamaica Broilers' (JB) chicken stock, the harsh economic climate and the Government's increasing imports of chicken parts have been blamed for the latest woes of chicken farmers.
JB Growers Association president Headley Brown said yesterday that chicken growers represented by the association have been experiencing lengthy bouts of inactivity on their farms, some for five to six months, as they have not been offered chickens from Jamaica Broilers, producers of the Best Dressed Chicken brand.
Under their agreement, the processing company provides the contract farmers (mostly in Clarendon and St. Catherine) with baby chicks to be reared. However, there is no formal agreement between company and farmer and the company can at any time terminate its relationship with a farmer.
Mr. Brown said that over 75 per cent of the more than 200 farmers he represents have been accumulating whopping bills as they still have to pay staff and honour other bills even though they have not been provided with new contracts from the company.
The remaining 25 per cent would have adapted to the newer tunnel house technology, he said, a system that seemed to be used indiscriminately by the company.
Tunnel houses are million-dollar ventilation houses which speed up the rearing process where chickens can be processed in six weeks as opposed to the months they used to take with the older method still utilised by most farmers.
Mr. Brown said that some farmers who had invested up to $10 million on their farms were still waiting, some being passed over for farmers with the more modern tunnel houses.
Yesterday Chris Levy, vice-president of the JB Group, while admitting that there was a glut in supply, said it was merely a best performance gauge that was being used to determine which farmers were given chickens by the company.
"We have a fair amount of chicken in storage, more than we'd like," he said. "This is a period when sales volume is down; it's really a market thing."
Explaining the farmers predicament, he said that harsh economic times called for stringent measures using the best performers.
"What has happened is that there has been an overcapacity in the farming community and we find that some of the worse performing farmers aren't being placed as readily as the better performers," he said. "Our contract is flock to flock and these are harsh economic times."
He also said the Government needed to take care of the problem of cheap imports of chicken parts flooding the market, to allow more room for local produce.
Mr. Brown said that the JB Group has called a meeting with farmers tomorrow to hear individual concerns.
