Zambia intensifies efforts to prevent importation of frozen and live chicken imports

ZAMBIA – Zambia has intensified efforts to prevent the importation of frozen and live chicken imports into the country, the Poultry Association of Zambia has revealed.

The Association Executive Director Dominic Chanda explained in an interview that moving forward the government will only allow the importation of the parent stocks into the country.

Parent stocks are the breeders used to produce the layers or broilers used in production houses. He added that the parent stocks will be coming in from areas that are certified by the government.

“We are not importing any chickens into the country,” Chanda said adding the chicken imports that were denied entry at the Kasumbalesa were mostly meant for the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) market.

Chanda noted that given its border location, the Kasumbelesa region is a weak link in the fight against illegal chicken imports in the country.

Kasumbalesa border post is shared between Zambia’s Copperbelt Province and DRC’s Katanga Province. It is a major crossing point for traffic and people between the countries, including the SADC and Central African regions.

Chanda revealed that in some situations, traders set up warehouses and cold rooms at the border where they import meat and poultry products on the pretext of taking them to the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) but ended up selling them in Zambia.

To address this weakness, the association under the leadership of Donald Chanda has called for harmonizing and regulating the trade environment for meat products at the Kasumbalesa border.

He notes that the unregulated way of doing business at the border was disadvantageous to the local poultry who had no access to the market.

With the proper mechanism to monitor and ensure that products that are imported and destined for DRC end up there and not in Zambia, Chanda is confident that the current anomaly can be corrected.

Despite illegal importation, Zambia’s poultry industry is thriving, exporting U$13.9M in Poultry Meat in 2021, making it the 51st largest exporter of Poultry Meat in the world, according to OEC.

The main destination of Poultry Meat exports from Zambia are the Democratic Republic of the Congo (US$13.2M), Malawi (US$651k), and Burundi (US$81.8k).

For all the latest food industry news from Africa and the World, subscribe to our NEWSLETTER, follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn, like us on Facebook and subscribe to our YouTube channel.