Why you’re paying 16.2% more for chicken

Karina, welcome, and let's get straight to it. Is the argument here, or your argument, that South Africans are paying more for chicken simply to protect the profits of local producers? Thank you for having me. So, our argument is actually threefold. It actually starts with the fact that, listen, a sunset review and a review of these duties is not a rite of passage. It's a new investigation. And on the facts of this new investigation, the

SAPA, the industry, hasn't been able to demonstrate that there will be a recurrence of injury, that will be the companies taking harm, as well as dumping. And in that respect, if we now extend the duties in the face of little to no evidence, it results in fewer competitors in the market, which then equals higher prices. So it's not simply to say a dumping duty will automatically or is going to just increase.

Prices just because. Sometimes we need to balance the rights of industry and the rights of having enough competition. What we're saying is the balance in this investigation falls on letting the duties lapse. So, let me pick you up on that balance. Again, as I understand it, and there's a degree of complexity here, local producers say cheap imports threaten South African jobs. Are you prepared to sacrifice those jobs for cheaper chicken? I think that it's

Too simple to say we are sacrificing or just to weigh it up like that. Remember that imports and increasing competition in the market will also increase jobs, and that's not often quantified, right? But what has to be heard is that importers also contribute to jobs and job creation in South Africa, and greater competition in the market will lead to job creation. Other than that, in the actual investigation,

Have increased, and the industry is in a very good competitive position to continue to improve and increase jobs without the duties. So, there will be, in our view, no negative effect if the duties lapse. Is there not a genuine danger that European producers could simply dump surplus chicken here at prices that our farmers simply cannot match? So, based on our analysis, Jeremy, we do not see that that is a possibility.

Facts that have been presented by SAPA is based on hypotheticals and models built from 2020. You have to really interrogate and say, listen, is there going to be a real likelihood of dumping from these nations? We found that Europe's exports to other countries are not being targeted by other countries. We've also found that Europe is serving its own market at the moment.