BACOLOD CITY -- Animal raisers in Negros Occidental are set to benefit from the proposed suggested retail prices (SRPs) for agriculture products such as chicken and fish.
Soon, the Department of Agriculture (DA) is expected to start implementing SRPs for agricultural products amid the continued high prices of the said commodities.
Dr. Renante Decena, provincial veterinarian, on Wednesday said this could benefit livestock and poultry raisers since the live weight prices of their commodities are very low compared to that of meat.
For instance, a live broiler has a farmgate price of only PHP70 while dressed chicken is sold by as much as PHP155 per head. The live weight price of a pig is only PHP95 while pork already costs PHP220 per kilogram.
“To me, this is disadvantageous to the raisers and producers,” Decena said.
In Negros Occidental, the Provincial Veterinary Office (PVO) livestock and poultry monitoring focuses on the price and supply in every local government unit or district.
For live animals, the monitoring is through auction markets while for meat products, through public markets province-wide.
Decena said setting SRPs on agricultural products would be advantageous to local backyard raisers because commercial raisers already have integrators that give value chain to their products.
“The SRPs will provide backyard raisers a good avenue to compete with commercial ones,” he added.
Decena also said the PVO is pushing for value-adding among hog raisers such as selling through meat shops and engaging in meat processing.
“They can compete if they will do marketing,” he added. (PNA)
