BARELY a month before the Christmas season peaks, poultry products, including eggs, are already registering an upward trend in their prices.
The average farm-gate price in the poultry subsector has increased by 8.4 percent for the first nine months of the year, the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics (BAS) reported in its Philippine Agricultural Performance for the first three quarters of the year.
“Chicken recorded a price gain of 9 percent due to high demand, [while] the price of duck meat was up by 7.34 percent because of sustained demand from eateries,” the BAS said.
The production decline of chicken eggs resulted in the 7.36 -ercent price gain, (while) bigger sizes of duck eggs produced during the reference period resulted in the 2.55-percent price increment.
In terms of production volume for the first nine months of this year, the poultry subsector produced 0.74-percent less output. The subsector accounted for 14.85 percent in the total agricultural production.
Although the actual chicken production went up by 0.54 percent for the period, the growth was not enough to bring up production of the poultry subsector, the BAS said, noting that the improvement in chicken output in the first half of the year was the result of increases in the volume of broiler production to meet the demand from the hotel and restaurant industry in Luzon and Mindanao.
Duck outdid last year’s performance and production grew by 0.3 percent this year, according to the report, adding that increases in duck disposal in Central Luzon, Central Visayas, Northern Mindanao, Eastern Visayas and Caraga during the reference period helped improve the production volume.
The report also noted that the 5.31-percent decrease in chicken-egg production. “The layer farms in Eastern Visayas were still in the process of building up their layer inventories after Supertyphoon Yolanda last year,” the BAS said.
Duck-egg production also declined by 0.91 percent, caused by the lower egg-laying efficiency ratio attributed to scarcity of water and lack of feeds from the rice fields in Western Visayas in the first quarter.
A lower number of laying flocks and adult females was recorded. Also, a low egg-laying efficiency ratio caused by hot weather conditions was noted in the second quarter of 2014.
In terms of value, poultry production amounted to P138 billion at current prices for the reporting period, the BAS also said.
“The price gains noted for all commodities contributed to the 7.6-percent growth in gross earnings of the subsector,” it said, adding that chicken came up with a 9.59-percent increase in gross receipts this year as a result of higher production and price.