Umamah Bakharia | ub@radioislam.co.za

2 min read
19 January 2023 | 14:48 CAT

Due to ongoing power cuts, the poultry industry has had to cull millions of chickens as suppliers struggle to keep fridges on and abattoir machinery running.

Picture credit: BFI Finance

The South African Poultry Association says this had to be done as the lack of processing the industry has faced over the past six weeks due to load shedding.

“It is a continuous flow process – we can’t stop the process and then restart the process because we will be breaking the toll chain of the particular product,” says the general manager of the South African Poultry Association, Izaak Breitenbach.

Meanwhile, the agriculture sector says it is also being hard hit by the electricity crisis with organisation AgriSA saying the continuous blackouts are putting farmers in a difficult position.

“The cost of diesel with the need to buy generators is really putting the agriculture sector under severe pressure,” says the executive director at Agri SA, Christo van der Rheede.

The continuation of Stage 6 load shedding in 2023 has increased risks across all sectors with many opting to eliminate liabilities like the poultry industry.