The high price of meat products

by Nilio Gumbs 08.APR.11

“You got to be a millionaire or some kind of petit bourgeoisie any time you live here in this country…” to provide for your family on your present salary, is an impossibility in this country”… “could you believe, one ‘nylon panty cost 1990 or 20 dollars for baby milk” – poignant words of the Mighty Sparrow in a 1983 calypso called ‘Capitalism Gone Mad,’ singing on what he perceived to be the high cost of living in Trinidad and Tobago.{{more}}

The situation here is now analogous to that in Trinidad and Tobago then and now. The high prices and declining purchasing power of the dollar is now the talk among consumers in this country. “As soon as you burst a $100 it done or a $100 is now like a $20” are the utterances of most Vincentians.

Some meat products which were once taken for granted and classified as ‘poor man food’ is now fast becoming the rich man’s delicacy. Chicken foot, liver, kidney and turkey are all following a similar trajectory as cod fish or salt fish in this country.

The days when salt fish was the poor man’s food for decades changed suddenly in the 1970s when prices went through the ceiling. Most Vincentians did not know the reason why. They put the blame on supermarkets and taxes imposed by the government of the day.

However, it was a decision by the European Economic Community to impose a limit on the amount of cod fish that could be caught in the North Atlantic to protect the depleting stock of Cod.. The laughable joke in international diplomacy is the Cod Wars between tiny Iceland and mighty Britain to protect migrating stock of Cod in the North Atlantic. The first took place in1958 when Iceland, starved of natural resources other than the sea, uni-laterally extended their fishing limits from 4 to a 12 mile radius. The second is when they extended their limit to a 50 mile radius, which drew criticism from other countries, including Britain.

The third was precipitated when Iceland again extended their limit to a 200 mile radius, arguing that the United Nations Law of the Sea Convention in 1974 gives it the right to a 200 mile coastal economic zone, with a 12-mile limit on territorial waters. Britain ignored this limit and continued to fish in this restricted area. British trawlers were accompanied by at least nine Frigates at one time or the other, while out at sea. The Icelandic Coast Guard and British trawlers rammed each other causing injuries to boats and human. The impasse was only solved when Iceland threatened to close a strategic naval base used by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and an agreement was brokered by its Secretary General.

An explanation could be had for the rise in the price of cod, but is there any for the high price of some meat products in this country? None!

Chicken wings and turkey parts are over EC$4 per pound, while chicken foot and liver hover over EC $5 and EC$6 per pound, respectively, at some supermarkets.

Chicken foot is classified as waste when slaughtered in the United States, and grounded as parts for animal feed. Big United States producers have a lucrative market in China, where US$854.3 billion worth of chicken meat was exported in 2009, where it is a popular culinary dish. Half of this total are wings and chicken feet, which sell for a few cents per pound in the United States. It is popular in Jamaica, where chicken foot soup is only superseded in popularity by Jerk pork and chicken, Ackee and Salt fish and Escovitch fish.

The European Union has strict guidelines on the sale of liver in member states – the only reason why aspiring Turks may be hesitant in seeking accession to the prestigious union grouping.

The price of the above meats mentioned is on the rise in this country. No rational explanation can be fathomed to justify such high prices. The only possible reasons being supply and demand mechanism at work, rising shipping cost to the Eastern Caribbean or the low volume purchased – a student taking Principles of Business would tell you – that when you buy in large bulks you get it at a lower price.

A government concerned about the poor will ensure that consumers should be able to obtain this source of protein at a considerably low prices. In Jamaica, the government excluded consumption tax on chicken back resulting in many Jamaicans arguing whether the government is saying – that they can at least eat chicken back everyday.

In Jamaica, liver, kidney, chicken foot and turkey were the cheapest meat products in the early years of the last decade. Turkey being cheap due to low demand, because Jamaicans liken such to resemble a “Jon krow” and a derogatory term to describe someone (Vincentian called it Cobeau).

One of the policy measures that the Barbados government sought to pursue as a result of the high commodity prices in 2008 was to encourage Barbados importers to source food from other destinations. An obvious logical choice is Brazil, a relatively close neighbour when compared to the United States or Canada. Brazil is now the largest producer of meats in the world (beef, pork, chicken and turkey). It is number two, only to the United States, in poultry products (chicken and turkey). Chile, Argentina and Colombia are major suppliers of food products in this hemisphere.

St. Vincent imports over EC$25 million worth of poultry products. Why can’t we plug that gaping hole in our balance of payments? It is impossible for us to produce chicken as cheap as the United States or Brazil because of economies of scale.

Many may argue that I am contradicting my initial point of the high prices in this country, which is so true; but if the benefit outweighs the cost in terms of employment opportunities and the saving of foreign exchange domestically, then why not pursue domestic production? It simply means that Vincentians as a people benefit as a whole and not a small minority who can afford such high prices. Simply not a case where the rich survive and the poor die by the wayside.’