Shift from pork seen if prices shoot up during Christmas

Despite its being a favorite treat for Christmas, pork may lose out to chicken and fish if its prices go up to P180 a kilo or higher, a Department of Agriculture official said. Agriculture Assistant Secretary Salvador Salacup made the assessment as he appealed to the public not to speculate on pork prices. “If consumers find pork too expensive, they will shift to chicken and fish. Our supplies of fish are plentiful, so some sectors should be careful in making price predictions. Let the market forces play and the consumer will be the final judge," he said in an interview on dzXL radio. “Huwag tayo mag-predict (Let us not make predictions)," he added. Salacup did not specify the consumer threshold for this year, but indicated past experiences showed a shift when pork prices reached P180/kilo. “Our experience showed that when pork prices went up to P180/kilo, consumers shifted," he said, amid speculations that pork prices may go all the way up to P228 per kilo during the Christmas season. Citing DA figures, he said pork consumption on a regular day is from 400 to 450 heads. During the Christmas season from December 5 to 31, the consumption goes up to 600 to 700 heads a day. On the other hand, Salacup said government has received assurances of a stable supply of fish and chicken. He said chicken traders were allowed to bring in 5,000 metric tons of chicken parts without special safeguard measures, after recent cyclones devastated chicken-growing areas in Central and Southern Luzon. Earlier, Salacup said they allowed the importation of pork after producers, mainly in Southern Luzon and Bicol, warned of a possible shortage. He said that as early as October, private sector distributors linked up with pork producers in Mindanao to ship in pork parts to Metro Manila. Importers are also due to bring in pork from United States and Canada. - GMANews.TV