DAWN.COM | Islamabad | Meat prices set to go up by 20 per cent

DAWN.COM | Islamabad | Meat prices set to go up by 20 per cent

Meat prices set to go up by 20 per cent

By A Reporter

Sunday, 15 Aug, 2010

ISLAMABAD, Aug 14: The local meat sellers are planning to increase the price by Rs50 on the pretext that the country is facing shortage of animals due to floods, Dawn has learnt.

This is despite the fact that the villagers are willing to sell animals at lower than market rates.

Meat sellers want to increase price by Rs50 per kilogram for mutton and around Rs30 per kilogram for beef, claming that large number of animals were killed in the floods and the remaining were not enough to meet the requirement.

“The situation is serious and we expect that meat prices would increase by up to 20 per cent in two weeks,” said Khursheed Qureshi, Chairman Jamiat–ul-Quraish, meat welfare association.

The authorities, including the international donors, estimate that around 450,000 domestic animals—goats, sheep, cattle, and loading animals—might have perished in the floods.

The meat merchants claim they were facing problems in purchasing animals from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and western and southern Punjab as weekly animal markets have not been held. “Unfortunately most of the cattle and goat rearing areas like Mianwali, Bhakhar, Layyah, Kot Addu and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have been hit by floods,” Mr Qureshi said.

This situation has created a new crisis for animals sellers. “There is no grass around, and the straw stored in the open and fields for animals has been swept away,” said Akram Burq, a resident of Khushab district, whose village has been inundated. “A young cow having a market value of Rs40,000 is being sold only for Rs25,000,” he added.

Many villagers are selling livestock at lower prices, as they cannot feed their cattle and fear that animals would die of disease and weakness.

“Actually it’s a balancing act to get away with some of the animals to save others,” said Asfandyar Khattak, who lives in a village near Nowshera. He said the older cows and buffaloes that give milk are costlier and people try to save such animals.

Mr Qureshi, who is also a director of the Dairy Development Board, acknowledged that livestock rates have declined in flood-hit areas.

“But the real benefit is being bagged by the middleman,” he said, adding that the devastating flood was hindering transportation of animals to main cities. He said the only way out of the situation is to import fodder to feed the surviving livestock.