Live chickens back on sale in Hong Kong after bird flu cull
PUBLISHED : Sunday, 11 January, 2015, 11:40am
UPDATED : Sunday, 11 January, 2015, 11:40am
Ernest Kao
Some 15,000 chickens were culled at Cheung Sha Wan market following the discovery of bird flu. Photo: SCMP
Live chickens are back on sale at Hong Kong's wet markets following the discovery of bird flu at the end of December and subsequent cull of thousands of birds.
Chicken vendors say retail prices have not risen too much, with regular locally farmed chickens up about 10 to 30 per cent, in the range of HK$60 to 70 per catty.
This morning some 3,200 birds were delivered to various retail outlets across the city.
One Kowloon City market chicken vendor surnamed Leung, known better by customers and colleagues as "Big Sister", said prices were only about 20 to 30 per cent higher but she was only able to secure about 60 chickens to sell, half her usual amount.
This morning stocks were also about two hours late arriving causing some inconvenience to her stall in terms of preparation work.
"It's a good start I guess and I'm happy all my customers get to buy fresh poultry," said Leung. "I'm optimistic because I know this [arrangement] is just temporary."
One customer, Mrs Chan, came all the way from her home in Shek Kip Mei once she heard of the resumption in sales. She pre-ordered and bought a 2.14-catty bird for HK$185.
"It usually only costs me about HK$160 but I wanted it so I don't really care too much about cost," Chan said. "
With no freshly slaughtered chicken to buy for almost two weeks, Chan said she had no choice but to eat only frozen chicken wings.
"The meat of live chicken is always better. Frozen chicken is disgusting," she said.
Customer Peter Tse said he read about the resumption in the newspaper and arrived to try his luck. He was able to buy an Emperor chicken for HK$75 per catty.
"It's either fresh chicken, or I don't buy," he said.
Sister Ling, a chicken vendor in the market who boasts actor Chow Yun-fat as a loyal customer, said she had started receiving her first phone orders at 7.30am and had sold eight birds by 9.30am. She was able to secure about 40 to 50 birds on Sunday, just half her usual amount.
Regular local New Terriories farm chickens were going for about HK$60 a catty, while special breed chickens such as the Kamei and Emperor chickens were on offer at their usual marked up prices.
"It's really not considered that expensive this time," she said. "I expect we'll be out of stock pretty quickly today."
The main wholesale poultry market at Cheung Sha Wan was closed on December 31 for disinfection after samples from a farm in Huizhou, Guangdong, tested positive for the deadly H7N9 strain of bird flu. Some 15,000 birds were killed to halt the infection from spreading.
