Argentina to become world’s 4th largest poultry producer

Aug. 2, 2012, Buenos Aires, Argentina – Industry Minister Debora Giorgi says Argentina is on track to become the fourth largest producer of poultry meat in the short term.

According to the Industrial Strategic Plan 2020, the sector achieved in less than a decade exports of 600,000 toones per year.

From 2003 until today, poultry production tripled, doubled the level of per capita consumption and export became tenfold from US $65 million to US $650 million. Argentina is now the ninth largest producer of poultry meat, producing 1.6 million tonnes.

“We are on track to be within a few years time the fourth largest producer of poultry meat,” said Giorgi.

She also stressed that Argentina “is the sixth largest exporter of poultry meat and sells to over 60 countries.” So far this year, it has already exported 356,000 tonnes, 100,000 of which were destined to Venezuela.

In 1970, it took 2.8 kilos of balanced food for a kilo of chicken and 75 days for a broiler chicken of 2,500 kg. In 2010, two kilos of food was required to do the same balanced kilo of chicken and 46 days for a broiler chicken of 2,760 kilos.

Since the incorporation of technology in the production chain, for 2017 producers are going to need 1.7 kilos of food and 38 days for a broiler chicken of 2,800 kilos, according to the data cite by Giorgi.

The forum on Argentina’s Poultry Industry Strategic Plan 2020 agreed to reach a consumption of poultry meat in the country of 50 kilos per capita per year, producing 3.1 million tonnes (91 per cent more than 2010), generating 50,000 jobs to achieve the 200,000 workers in the sector and export 600,000 tonnes per year.

Every tonne of corn and soybeans exported by Argentina means an average income of US $620. In the poultry sector, that same tonne processed into chicken can generate foreign exchange of 2.300 and 2.900 if it is exported as bucking chicken cooked.

Argentina registered a steady growth since 2003, going from 300 million head of poultry slaughtered, compared with over 700 million in 2011, while consumption of poultry meat in the period 2003-2011 increased from 18 to 39.5 kg per capita.