ASF to further push up pork, chicken prices

Consumers would have to further tighten their belts as prices of pork and even chicken show no signs of going down, especially now that African swine fever (ASF) has crept into the Visayas.

- LOUISE MAUREEN SIMEON

Agriculture stakeholders have agreed that retail prices of pork and chicken, Filipinos’ main protein sources, will likely be more expensive once ASF has spread further in the Visayas, just like it did in Luzon and Mindanao.

The first case of ASF in the Visayas was recently confirmed in Abuyog, Leyte. While Leyte is not a major hog producing area, the Pork Producers Federation of the Philippines (ProPork) noted that current supplies continue to be thin.

“It may jump to other areas, that’s why producers have to be vigilant and not lower their guards. It is human-driven, like COVID,” ProPork president Edwin Chen told The STAR.

“It really depends on the law of supply and demand. It could increase further but it is hard to say. Consumers also jump to other protein sources like chicken and eggs. Prices of these can also increase,” he said.

The Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (Sinag) echoed the same sentiment, saying that as long as the Department of Agriculture (DA) will not check frozen pork coming into the country, ASF will continue to spread.

Out of the 13 million in the hog inventory, Luzon is around 6.9 million, and only 30 percent of that has been left. “Visayas and Mindanao have lost an estimated 800,000 already. So, we do not see prices going down,” Sinag chair Rosendo So told The STAR.