PPA dismayed over 10 percent import duty on poultry

LAHORE: The Pakistan Poultry Association (PPA) has expressed dismay on the levy of additional 10 percent import duty on live poultry under the Heading 01.05 (weighing less than 185 grams), which includes only the basic stock of poultry the ‘Grandparents’.

A PPA spokesman said that the grandparents are a multiplying seed, which produce parents, which subsequently produce broiler chicks and end up in chicken meat on the table of the consumers.

Seeds of all kinds have been exempted from any additional tax. Grandparents, though being seed, have been taxed.

“Today, invariably chicken is cheaper than pulses and most of the vegetables too,” the spokesman said, adding that the entire edifice of the poultry structure rests on the import of a handful of grandparents, which could not provide any significant revenue to the government but would only increase the initial cost of the grandparent farmers.

The association expressed dismay on the fact that probably the poultry sector is on the wrong side of those who matter in the chain of taxation, he said.

Items falling under Fifth Schedule have been generally exempted, but in the budget speech a specific exclusion was made to items of poultry sector for levying additional import duty.

The association is also surprised that while finished chicken meat and its value-added products are allowed to be imported duty-free from Malaysia and on preferred lower rate of import duty from China and at only five percent duty from India, even though India has placed imports from Pakistan on their Sensitive List, yet further encouragement is being given to imports by increasing the cost of locally-produced chicken meat and poultry products.

The imported raw materials, which are used for the production of value-added chicken products, have been subject to an additional import duty of five percent.

While raw materials have been generally exempted from additional tax, the wrath of the government has fallen upon the poultry sector, the association said.

Yet another measure, which would increase the cost, is the levy of 30 percent regulatory duty on import of corn, almost 70 percent of which is consumed by the poultry sector as a very important component of poultry feed. Poultry feed includes 40 percent to 50 percent corn.

It would have been prudent to levy a regulatory duty on the import of finished poultry products rather than its seed and its inputs. It appears that imports are being encouraged, the spokesman added.