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Animal husbandry suffering seriously
High feed prices, unsuitable import tax policies, high bank interest rates and prolonged epidemics all have pushed farms against the wall.
Hoai Duc district is considered the key breeding region in Hanoi. 20,000 households there are living on animal husbandry. However, according to the Hoai Duc Sub-department of Agriculture and Rural Development, 50% of the households have given up the job as they have been seriously suffering from the price storm. Most of the households have small breeding scales (less than 10 pigs or 50 fowl).
Cao Van Tuyen, Deputy Head of the sub-department, said that a lot of households have left their pigsties and hen-coops idle because they do not have money to continue farming.
High feed prices and epidemics have been burdening pig-breeding households. Nguyen Dat, a farmer in Hoai Duc district, related that last year he bred 50 pigs, while he is breeding seven pigs now. “Breeding pigs now cannot bring profit to farmers. The price has been decreasing continuously,” Dat said.
There are only 400-500 households now living on animal husbandry, while the figure once was over 1,000.
Chairman of the Cat Que commune People’s Committee Nguyen Trong Ty said that most breeding households have reported losses, while luckier ones are breaking even. It is because of the higher feed prices and lower purchasing demand. The number of pigs in the commune has decreased by 6,000 to 20,000 now.
According to the Director of the Hanoi Department for Agriculture and Rural Development Tran Xuan Viet, it is estimated that the number of pigs and fowls have decreased by 5% due to the massive imports of meat. There are 1.65mil pigs and 6mil fowl in the city, while the figure is forecast to decrease in the time to come.
“If the government does not take action to limit imports and protect local production, a lot more breeding households will have to give up the job,” he said.
Nguyen Nhu So, General Director of Bac Ninh Farm Produce Company (Dabaco), said that with the current price of VND25,000/kg of chicken, the company is incurring the loss of VND2,000/kg. Similarly, as pork is selling at VND35,000/kg, the company is incurring the loss of VND3,000/kg.
So said that the company is churning out 300-400,000 fowls and 5,000 pigs a month, which means the heavy loss of several hundred million VND a month. A recent survey by the company showed that 80% of the farming households which provide materials for the company have given up the job, leading to the drop of 20% in the company’s sales.
According to Phung Duc Tien, Director of the Thuy Phuong Poultry Institute, everything is getting more expensive, except breeders and meat.
Tien said that one kilogramme of feed was sold at VND4,500/kg last year, while a wild goose breeder was sold at VND8-9,000. Meanwhile, the figures are now VND8,000/kg and VND7,000 per breeder.
Which is the way out?
Deputy Chairman of the National Assembly’s Science, Technology and Environment Committee Nguyen Dang Vang said that if the situation cannot be improved, at least one million farmers will lose their jobs every year.
Vang said that a lot of countries are trying to export meat to Vietnam. “We are making us poorer by unsuitable import tax policies. More jobs will be lost in 1-2 more years,” he said.
In an attempt to rescue Vietnamese consumers from the price storm, the government lowered the import tax on farm produce to rates below the levels stipulated in its WTO commitments. However, while consumers have been rescued, farmers are dying.
So from Dabaco said that the government needs to save the breeding industry by raising the import tax on import meat.
In the latest news, Head of the Animal Husbandry Department under the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development Hoang Kim Giao on September 23 said that the ministry is going to propose that the Ministry of Finance and the government raise the import tax and follow its WTO commitments in setting taxes.
VNA
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